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HOME AGAIN 








GEORGE MACDONALD’S WRITINGS. 


WITH ILLUSTRATIONS ON WOOD AND STEEL. 


11 A mine of original and quaint similitudes. Their 
deep perceptions of human nature are certainly remark- 
able ." — Century Magazine. 

Annals of a Quiet Neighborhood. 

The Seaboard Parish. A Sequel to Annals of a Quiet 
Neighborhood. 

Guild Court. A London Story. 

Alec Forbes of Howglen. 

Robert Falconer. 

The Vicar’s Daughter. An Autobiographical Story. 

Paul Faber, Surgeon. 

Thomas Wingfold, Curate. 

Wilfrid Cumbermede. An Autobiographical Story. 

Sir Gibbie. 

St. George and St. Michael. A Novel, 
j Phantastes. A Faerie Romance for Men and Women. 

1 The Portent. A Story. 

David Elginbrod. 

Adela Cathcart. 

Malcolm. 

The Marquis of Lossie. 

Warlock O’ Glen war lock. A Homely Roman :e. 

Mary Marston. 

Weighed and Wanting. 

Stephen Archer and Other Tales. 

Donal Grant. 

What’s Mine’s Mine. 

There and Back. 



j Home Agai 
j The Flight 


SOLD SEPARATELY. 


24 Volumes, nmo, Cloth (in box), per set, $36.00. 
Cloth, per volume, $1.50. 


May be obtained of all Booksellers or will be sent , pre- 
paid , on receipt of price by the Publishers. 

GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, Limited. 

Lafayette Place, New York. 





























































* 













































/ 


HOME AGAIN 


BY 

GEORGE MAC DONALD 

// 

AUTHOR OF 

“MALCOLM,’' “ANNALS OF A QUIET NEIGHBORHOOD,” ETC. 



GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS, Limited 

NEW YORK: 9 LAFAYETTE PLACE 
LONDON AND MANCHESTER 



Authorized Edition. 


/VS'/f/ 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I. The Parlour ... ... ... 

• • • 

PAGE 

I 

II. 

The Arbour 


9 

III. 

A Pennyworth of Thinking 

... 

15 

IV. 

A Living Force 


25 

V. 

Flutterbies 

... 

29 

VI. 

From Home ... 


42 

VII. 

A Change 

... 

50 

VIII. 

At Work 


56 

IX. 

Flattery 

... 

63 

X. 

The Round of the World ... 


75 

XI. 

The Song 

... 

80 

XII. 

Love 


87 

XIII. 

“ Home is where the Heart is ? ” 

... 

96 

XIV. 

A Midnight Review 


104 

XV. 

Reflection 


113 

XVI. 

The Ride together 


123 


VI 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER 


PAGE 

XVII. 

His Book 

... 131 

XVIII. 

A Winter Afternoon 

138 

XIX. 

The Bodiless ... 

... 150 

XX. 

The Soulless 

156 

XXI. 

The Last Ride 

... 171 

XXII. 

The Summer-House 

179 

XXIII. 

The Park 

... 191 

XXIV. 

The Drawing-Room 

196 

XXV. 

A Midnight Interview 

... 208 

XXVI. 

A Period ... 

221 

XXVII. 

A Fruitless Journey ... 

... 251 

XXVIII. 

Doing and Dreaming 

261 

XXIX. 

Dream-Molly ... 

... 274 

XXX. 

Work-a-day Molly 

284 

XXXI. 

This Picture and this 

... 293 

XXXII. 

The Last, but not the End 

308 


HOME AGAIN 


CHAPTER I. 

THE PARLOUR. 

In the dusk of the old-fashioned best room of 
a farm-house, in the faint glow of the buried 
sun through the sods of his July grave, sat two 
elderly persons, dimly visible, breathing the 
odour which roses unseen sent through the 
twilight and open window. One of the two 
was scarcely conscious of the odour, for she 
did not believe in roses ; she believed mainly 
in mahogany, linen, and hams ; to the other 
it brought too much sadness to be welcomed, 
for it seemed, like the sunlight, to issue from 
the grave of his vanished youth. He was 


2 


HOME AGAIN. 


not by nature a sad man ; he was only one 
that had found the past more delightful than 
the present, and had not left his first loves. 
The twilight of his years had crept upon him 
and was deepening ; and he felt his youth 
slowly withering under their fallen leaves. 
With more education, and perhaps more recep- 
tivity than most farmers, he had married a 
woman he fervently loved, whose rarely truthful 
nature, to which she had striven to keep true, 
had developed the delicate flower of moral and 
social refinement ; and her influence upon him 
had been of the eternal sort. While many of 
their neighbours were vying with each other in 
the effort to dress, and dwell, and live up to 
their notion of gentility , Richard Colman and 
his wife had never troubled themselves about 
fashion, but had sought to please each the taste 
of the other, and cultivate their own. Perhaps 
now as he sat thus silent in the dimmits , he was 
holding closer converse than he knew, or any 
of us can know, with one who seemed to have 


THE PARLOUR. 3 

vanished from all this side of things, except the 
heart of her husband. That clung to what 
people would call her memory ; I prefer to call 
it her. 

The rose-scented hush was torn by the strident, 
cicala-like shrilling of a self-confident, self-satis- 
fied female voice : — 

“ Richard, that son of yours will come to no 
good ! You may take my word for it ! ” 

Mr. Colman made no answer ; the dusky, 
sweet-smelling waves of the silence closed over 
its laceration. 

“ I am well aware my opinion is of no value 
in your eyes, Richard ; but that does not absolve 
me from the duty of stating it : if you allow 
him to go on as he is doing now, Walter will 
never eat bread of his own earning ! ” 

“ There are many who do, and yet don’t come 
to much!” half thought, but nowise said the 
father. 

“ What do you mean to make of him ? ” per- 
sisted Miss Hancock, the half-sister of his wife, 


4 


HOME AGAIN 


the a in whose name Walter said ought to have 
been an e. 

“Whatever he is able to make himself. He 
must have the main hand in it, whatever it be,” 
answered .Mr. Colman. 

“ It is time twice over he had set about some- 
thing ! You let him go on dawdling and dawd- 
ling without even making up his mind whether 
or not he ought to do anything ! Take my 
word for it, Richard, you’ll have him on your 
hands till the day of your death ! ” 

The father did not reply that he could wish 
nothing better, that the threat was more than 
he could hope for. He did not want to pro- 
voke his sister-in-law, and he knew there was 
a shadow of reason in what she said, though 
even perfect reason could not have sweetened 
the mode in which she said it. Nothing could 
make up for the total absence of sympathy 
in her utterance of any modicum of truth she 
was capable of uttering. She was a very dusty 
woman, and never more dusty than when she 


THE PARLOUR. 


5 


fought against dust as in a warfare worthy of 
all a woman’s energies — one who, because she 
had not a spark of Mary in her, imagined her- 
self a Martha. She was true as steel to the 
interests of those in whose life hers was involved, 
but only their dusty interests, not those which 
make man worth God’s trouble. She was a vessel 
of clay in an outhouse of the temple, and took 
on her the airs — not of gold, for gold has 
no airs — but the airs of clay imagining itself 
gold, and all the golden vessels nothing but 
clay. 

“ I put it to you, Richard Colman,” she went 
on, “ whether good ever came of reading poetry, 
and falling asleep under hay-stacks ! He 
actually writes poetry ! — and we all know what 
that leads to ! ” 

“ Do we ? ” ventured her brother-in-law. “ King 
David wrote poetry ! ” 

“ Richard, don’t garble ! I will not have you 
garble ! You know what I mean as well as I do 
myself! And you know as well as I do what 


6 


HOME AGAIN. 


comes of writing poetry! That friend of Walter’s 
who borrowed ten pounds of you — did he ever 
pay it you ? ” 

“ He did, Ann.” 

“ You didn’t tell me ! ” 

“ I did not want to disappoint you ! ” replied 
Richard, with a sarcasm she did not feel. 

“ It was worth telling ! ” she returned. 

“ I did not think so. Everybody does not 
stick to a bank-note like a snail to the wall ! — I 
returned him the money.” 

“ Returned him the money ! ” 

“Yes.” 

“Made him a present of ten pounds l” 

“ Why not ? ” 

“Why then?” 

“ I had more reasons than one/’ 

“And no call to explain them! It was just 
like you to throw away your hard earnings upon 
a fellow that would never earn anything for 
himself ! As if one such wasn’t enough to take 
all you’d got ! ’* 


THE PARLOUR. 


7 

“How could he send back the money if 
that had been the case! He proved himself 
what I believed him, ready and willing to 
work! The money went for a fellow's bread 
and cheese, and what better money’s worth 
would you have?” 

" You may some day want the bread and cheese 
for yourself ! ” 

“ One stomach is as good as another ! ” 

“ It never was and never will be any use 
talking to some people ! ” concluded sister Ann, 
in the same tone she began with, for she seldom 
lost her temper — though no one would have 
much minded her losing it, it was so little worth 
keeping. Rarely angry, she was always dis- 
agreeable. The good that was in her had no 
flower, but bore its fruits, in the shape of good 
food, clean linen, mended socks, and such like, 
without any blossom of sweet intercourse to 
make life pleasant. 

Aunt Ann would have been quite justified in 
looking on poetry with contempt had it been 


8 


HOME AGAIN. 


what she imagined it. Like many others, she 
had decided opinion's concerning things of which 
her idea nowise corresponded with the things 
themselves. 


( 9 ) 


CHAPTER II. 

THE ARBOUR. 

WHILE the elders thus conversed in the dusky 
drawing-room, where the smell of the old roses 
almost overpowered that of the new, another 
couple sat in a little homely bower in the garden. 
It was Walter and his rather distant cousin 
Molly Wentworth, who for fifteen years had been 
as brother and sister. Their fathers had been 
great friends, and when Molly’s died in India, 
and her mother speedily followed him, Richard 
Colman took the little orphan, who was at the 
time with a nurse in England, home to his house, 
much to the joy of his wife, who had often 
longed for a daughter to perfect the family idea. 
The more motherly a woman is, the nearer will 

* 


10 


HOME AGAIN, 


the child of another satisfy the necessities of her 
motherhood. Mrs. Colman could not have said 
which child she loved best. 

Over the still summer garderi rested a weight 
of peace. It was a night to the very mind of 
the fastidious, twilight-loving bat, flitting about, 
coming and going, like a thought we cannot 
help. Most of Walter’s thoughts came and 
went thus. He had not yet learned to think ; 
he was hardly more than a medium in which 
thought came and went. Yet when a thought 
seemed worth anything, he always gave himself 
the credit of it! — as if a man were author of 
his own thoughts any more than of his own 
existence ! A man can but live so with the life 
given him, that this or that kind of thoughts 
shall call on him, and to this or that kind he 
shall not be at home. Walter was only at that 
early stage of development where a man is in 
love with what he calls his own thoughts. 

Even in the dark of the summer-house one 
might have seen that he was pale, and might 


THE ARBOUR. 


II 


have suspected him handsome. In the daylight 
his gray eyes might almost seem the source of 
his paleness. His features were well marked 
though delicate, and had a notable look of dis- 
tinction. He was above the middle height, and 
slenderly built ; had a wide forehead, and a 
small, pale moustache on an otherwise smooth 
face. His mouth was the least interesting fea- 
ture ; it had great mobility, but when at rest, 
little shape and no attraction. For this, however, 
his smile made considerable amends. 

The girl was dark, almost swarthy, with the 
clear, pure complexion, and fine-grained skin, 
which more commonly accompany the hue. If 
at first she gave the impression of delicacy, it 
soon changed into one of compressed life, of 
latent power. Through the night, where she 
now sat, her eyes were too dark to appear ; they 
sank into it, and were as the unseen soul of the 
dark ; while her mouth, rather large and ex- 
quisitely shaped, with the curve of a strong bow, 
seemed as often as she smiled to make a pale 


12 


HOME AGAIN. 


window in the blackness. Her hair came rather 
low down the steep of her forehead, and, with 
the strength of her chin, made her face look 
rounder than seemed fitting. 

They sat for a time as silent as the night that 
infolded them. They were not lovers, though 
they loved each other, perhaps, more than either 
knew. They were watching to see the moon 
rise at the head of the valley on one of whose 
high sloping sides they sat. 

The moon kept her tryst, and revealed a love- 
liness beyond what the day had to show. She 
looked upon a wide valley, that gleamed with 
the windings of a river. She brightened the 
river, and dimmed in the houses and cottages 
the lights with which the opposite hill sparkled 
like a celestial map. Lovelily she did her work 
in the heavens, her poor mirror-work — all she 
was fit for now, affording fit room, atmosphere, 
and medium to young imaginations, unable yet 
to spread their wings in the sunlight, and believe 
what lies hid in the light of the workaday world 


THE ARBOUR. 1 3 

Nor was what she showed the less true for what 
lay unshown in shrouded antagonism. The 
vulgar cry for the real would bury in deepest 
grave every eternal fact. It is the cry, “Not 
this man, but Barabbas ! ” The day would 
reveal a river stained with loathsome refuse, and 
rich gardens on hillsides mantled in sooty smoke 
and evil-smelling vapours, sent up from a valley 
where men, like gnomes, toiled and caused to 
toil too eagerly. What would one think of a 
housekeeper so intent upon saving that she 
could waste no time on beauty or cleanliness ? 
How many who would storm if they came home 
to an untidy house, feel no shadow of uneasiness 
that they have all day been defiling the house of 
the Father, nor at night lifted hand to cleanse 
it ! Such men regard him as a fool, whose joy a 
foul river can poison ; yet, as soon as they have 
by pollution gathered and saved their god, they 
make haste to depart from the spot they have 
ruined ! Oh for an invasion of indignant ghosts, 
to drive from the old places the generation that 


14 HOME AGAIN. 

dishonours the ancient Earth ! The sun shows 
all their disfiguring, but the friendly night comes 
at length to hide her disgrace ; and that well 
hidden, slowly ascends the brooding moon to 
unveil her beauty. 

For there was a thriving town full of awful 
chimneys in the valley, and the clouds that rose 
from it ascended above the (Dolmans’ farm to 
the great moor which stretched miles and miles 
beyond it. In the autumn sun its low forest of 
heather burned purple ; in the pale winter it lay 
white under snow and frost ; but through all the 
year winds would blow across it the dull smell 
of the smoke from below. Had such a fume 
risen to the earthly paradise, Dante would 
have imagined his purgatory sinking into hell. 
On all this inferno the night had sunk like a 
foretaste of cleansing death. The fires lay 
smouldering like poor, hopeless devils, fain to 
sleep. The world was merged in a tidal wave 
from the ocean of hope, and seemed to heave a 
restful sigh under its cooling renovation. 


( i5 ) 


CHAPTER III. 

A PENNYWORTH OF THINKING. 

“ A PENNY for your thought, Walter ! ” said the 
girl after a long silence, in which the night 
seemed at length to cla^sp her too close. 

“Your penny, then! I was thinking how 
wild and sweet the dark wind would be blowing 
up there among the ringing bells of the heather.” 

“You shall have the penny. I will pay you 
with your own coin. I keep all the pennies I 
win of you. What do you do with those you 
win of me ? ” 

“ Oh, I don’t know ! I take them because 
you insist on paying your bets, but ” 

“Debts, you mean, Walter! You know I 
never bet, even in fun ! I hate taking things 
for nothing ! I wouldn’t do it 1 ” 


1 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Then what are you making me do now ? ” 

“Take a penny for the thought I bought of 
you for a penny. That’s fair trade, not gambling. 
And your thought to-night is well worth a 
penny. I felt the very wind on the moor for 
a moment ! ” 

“ I’m afraid I shan’t get a penny a thought in 
London ! ” 

“Then you are going to London, Walter ? ” 

“Yes, indeed! What # else! What is a man 
to do here ? ” 

“What is a man to do there?” 

“ Make his way in the world.” 

“But, Walter, please let me understand! in- 
deed I don’t want to be disagreeable ! What 
do you wish to make your way to ? ” 

“ To such a position as ” 

Here he stopped unsure. 

“You mean to fame, and honour, and riches, 
don’t you, Walter ? ” ventured Molly. 

“ No — not riches. Did you ever hear of a 
poet and riches in the same breath ? ” 


A PENNYWORTH OF THINKING. 1 7 

“Oh, yes, I have! — though somehow they 
don’t seem to go together comfortably. If a 
poet is rich, he ought to show he couldn’t 
help it.” 

“ Suppose he was made a lord, where would 
he then be without money ? ” 

“ If to be a lord one must be rich, he ought 
never to wish to be a lord. But you do not 
want to be either lord or millionaire, Walter, do 
you ? ” 

“ I hope I know better ! ” 

“ Where does the way you speak of lead then, 
Walter ? To fame ? ” 

“If it did, what would you have to say 
against it ? Even Milton calls it ‘ That last 
infirmity of noble mind ’ ! ” 

“ But he calls it an infirmity, and such a bad 
infirmity, apparently, that it is the hardest of all 
to get rid of ! ” 

The fact was that Walter wanted to be — 
thought he was a poet, but was far from certain 
— feared indeed it might not be so, therefore 


i8 


HOME AGAIN. 


desired greatly the verdict of men in his favour, 
if but for his own satisfaction. Fame was 
precious to him as determining, he thought, 
his position in the world of letters — his kingdom 
of heaven. Well read, he had not used his 
reading practically enough to perceive that the 
praise of one generation may be the contempt 
of another, perhaps of the very next, so that 
the repute of his time could assure him of 
nothing. He did not know the worthlessness 
of the opinion that either grants or withholds 
fame. 

He looked through the dark at his cousin, 
thinking, “What sets her talking of such things ? 
How can a girl understand a man with his 
career before him ! ” 

She read him through the night and his 
silence. 

“I know what you are thinking, Walter!’* 
she said. “You are thinking women can’t think. 
But I should be ashamed not to have common 
sense, and I cannot see the sense of doing 


A PENNYWORTH OF THINKING. 19 

anything for a praise that can help nothing and 
settle nothing.” 

“Why then should all men have the desire 
for it ? ” 

“ That they may get rid of it. Why have all 
men vanity ? Where would the world be on 
the way to now, if Jesus Christ had sought the 
praise of men ? ” 

“ But he has it ! ” 

“ Not much of it yet, I suspect. He does not 
care for the praise that comes before obedience ! 
— That’s what I have heard your father say.” 

“ I never heard him ! ” 

“ I have heard him say it often. What could 
Jesus care for the praise of one whose object in 
life was the praise of men ! ” 

Walter had not lived so as to destroy the 
reverence of his childhood. He believed himself 
to have high ideals. He felt that a man must 
be upright, or lose his life. So strongly did he 
feel it, that he imagined himself therefore upright, 
incapable of a dishonest or mean thing. He had 


20 


HOME AGAIN. 


never done, never could, he thought, do anything 
unfair. But to what Molly said, he had no 
answer. What he half thought in his silence, 
was something like this : that Jesus Christ was 
not the type of manhood, but a man by himself, 
who came to do a certain work ; that it was both 
absurd and irreverent to talk as if other men had 
to do as he did, to think and feel like him ; that 
he was so high above the world he could not 
care for its fame, while to mere man its praises 
must be dear. Nor did Walter make any right 
distinction between the approbation of under- 
standing men, who know the thing they praise, 
and the empty voice of the unwise many. 

In a word, Walter thought, without knowing 
he did, that Jesus Christ was not a man. 

“ I think, Molly,” he said, “ we had better 
avoid the danger of irreverence.” 

For the sake of his poor reverence he would 
frustrate the mission of the Son of God ; by its 
wretched mockery justify himself in refusing the 
judgment of Jesus! 


A PENNYWORTH OF THINKING. 


21 


“ I know you think kindly of me, Molly,” he 
went on, “ and I should be sorry to have you 
misunderstand me ; but surely a man should not 
require religion to make him honest ! I scorn 
the notion. A man must be just and true 
because he is a man ! Surely a man may keep 
clear of the thing he loathes ! — For my own 
honour,” he added, with a curl of his lip, “ I shall 
at least do nothing disgraceful, however I may 
fall short of the angelic.” 

“ I doubt,” murmured Molly, “ whether a man 
is a man until he knows God.” 

But Walter, if he heard the words, neither 
heeded nor answered them. He was far from 
understanding the absurdity of doing right from 
love of self. 

He was no hypocrite. He did turn from 
what seemed to him degrading. But there were 
things degrading which he did not see to be 
such, things on which some men to whom he did 
not yet look up, would have looked down. Also 
there was that in his effort to sustain his self- 


22 


HOME AGAIN. 


respect which was far from pure : he despised 
such as had failed ; and to despise the human 
because it has fallen, is to fall from the human. 
He had done many little things he ought to be, 
and one day must be, but as yet felt no occasion 
to be — ashamed of. So long as they did not 
trouble him they seemed nowhere. Many a 
youth starts in life like him, possessed with the 
idea, not exactly formulated, that he is a most 
precious specimen of pure and honourable 
humanity. It comes of self-ignorance, and a 
low ideal taken for a high one. Such are mainly 
among the well-behaved, and never doubt them- 
selves a prize for any woman. The)' colour 
their notion of themselves with their ideal, and 
then mistake the one for the other. The mass 
of weaknesses and conceits that compose their 
being they compress into their ideal mould of 
man, and then regard the shape as their own. 
What composes it they do not heed. 

No man, however, could look in the refined 
face of Walter Colman and imagine him 


A PENNYWORTH OF THINKING. 23 

cherishing sordid views of life. Asked what 
of all things he most admired, he might truly 
answer, “The imaginative intellect.” He was 
a fledgling poet. He worshipped what he 
called thoughts, would rave about a thought 
in the abstract, apostrophize an uncaught idea. 
When a concrete thinkable one fell to him, he 
was jubilant over the isolate thing, and with 
his joy its value had nothing to do. He would 
stand wrapt in the delight of what he counted 
its beauty, and yet more in the delight that his 
was the mind that had generated such a meteor ! 
To be able to think pretty things was to him 
a gigantic distinction ! A thought that could 
never be soul to any action, would be more 
valuable to him than the perception of some 
vitality of relation demanding the activity of 
the whole being. He would call thoughts the 
stars that glorify the firmament of humanity, 
but the stars of his firmament were merely 
atmospheric — pretty fancies, external likenesses. 
That the grandest thing in the world is to be an 


24 


HOME AGAIN. 


accepted poet, is the despotic craze of a vast 
number of the weak-minded and half-made of 
both sexes. It feeds poetic fountains of plentiful 
yield, but insipid and enfeebling flow, the mere 
sweat of weakness under the stimulus of self- 
admiration. 


( 25 ) 


CHAPTER IV. 

A LIVING FORCE. 

WALTER was the very antipode of the Molly 
he counted commonplace, one outside the region 
of poetry : she had a passion for turning a think 
into a thing. She had a strong instinctive 
feeling that she was in the world to do some- 
thing, and she saw that if nobody tried to keep 
things right, they would go terribly wrong : 
what then could she be there for but to set or 
keep things right ! and if she could do nothing 
with the big things, she must be the busier with 
the little things ! Besides, who could tell how 
much the little might have to do with the big 
things ! The whole machine depended on 
every tiny wheel ! She could not order the 
clouds, but she could keep some weeds from 


2 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


growing, and then when the rain came, they 
would not take away the good of it ! 

The world might be divided into those who 
let things go, and those who do not ; into the 
forces and facts, the slaves and fancies ; those 
who are always doing something on God’s 
creative lines, and those that are always grumb- 
ling and striving against them. 

“ Another penny for your thought, Walter ! ” 
said Molly. 

“ I am not going to deal with you. This 
time you would not think it worth a penny ! 
Why are you so inquisitive about my thoughts?” 

“ I want to know what you meant when you 
said the other day that thoughts were better 
than things.” 

Walter hesitated. The question was an in- 
clined plane leading to unknown depths of 
argument ! 

“See, Walter,” said Molly, “here is a narcissus 
— a pheasant’s eye : tell me the thought that is 
better than this thing ! ” 


A LIVING FORCE. 


27 


How troublesome girls were when they asked 
questions ! 

“Well,” he said, not very logically, “that 
narcissus has nothing but air around it ; my 
thought of the narcissus has mind around it.” 

“Then a thought is better than a thing be- 
cause it has thought round about it ? ” 

“Well, yes.” 

“Did the thing come there of itself, or did 
it come of God’s thinking ? ” 

“Of God’s thinking.” 

“ And God is always the same ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“Then God’s thought is about the narcissus 
still — and the narcissus is better than your 
thought of it ! ” 

Walter was silent 

“ I should so like to understand ! ” said Molly. 
“ If you have a thought more beautiful than the 
narcissus, Walter, I should like to see it ! Only 
if I could see it, it would be a thing, would it 
not? A thing must be a think before it be a 


2 


28 


HOME AGAIN. 


thing. A thing is a ripe think, and must be 
better than a think — except it lose something 
in ripening — which may very well be with man’s 
thoughts, but hardly with God’s ! I will keep in 
front of the things, and look through them to 
the thoughts behind them. I want to under- 
stand ! If a thing were not a thought first, it 
would not be worth anything ! And every thing 
has to be thought about, else we don’t see what 
it is ! I haven’t got it quite ! ” 

Instead of replying, Walter rose, and they 
walked to the house side by side in silence. 

“Could a thought be worth anything that 
God had never cared to think ? ” said Molly to 
herself as they went. 


( 29 ) 


CHAPTER V. 

FLUTTERBIES. 

Mr. COLMAN and his adopted daughter were 
fast friends — so fast and so near that they could 
talk together about Walter, though but the 
adoptive brother of the one, and the real son of 
the other. Richard had inherited, apparently, his 
wife’s love to Molly, and added it to his own ; 
but their union had its root in the perfect truth- 
fulness of the two. Real approximation, real 
union must ever be in proportion to mutual 
truthfulness. It was quite after the usual 
fashion, therefore, between them, when Molly 
began to tell her father about the conversation 
she had had with Walter. 

“What first made you think, Molly, of such 


30 


HOME AGAIN. 


a difference between thoughts and things ? ” 
asked Mr. Colman. 

“I know quite well,” answered Molly. “You 
remember our visit to your old school-friend, 
Mr. Dobson?” 

“ Of course ; perfectly.” 

Mr. Dobson was a worthy clergyman, doing 
his weary best in a rural parish. 

“ And you remember Mrs. Evermore ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ You thought her name a funny one ; but 
you said it ought to have been ‘ Nevermore * 
because she seemed never to get any farther ! ” 

“ Come, come, Molly ! that won’t do ! It was 
you, not I, that said such a spiteful thing ! ” 

“ It was true anyway ! ” answered Molly ; 
“ and you agreed with me ; so if I said it first, 
you said it last! Well, I had to study this 
Mrs. Evermore. From morning to night she 
was evermore on the hunt after new fancies. 
She watched for them, stalked them, followed 
them like a boy with a butterfly-net. She caught 


FLUTTERBIES. 


31 


them too, of the sort she wanted, plentifully. 
But none ever came to anything, so far as I 
could see. She never did anything with one of 
them. Whatever she caught had a cage to 
itself, where it sat on ‘ the all-alone-stone. ’ 
Every other moment, while you and Mr. 
Dobson were talking, she would cry ‘ oh ! oh ! 
o — o — oh ! ’ and pull out her note-book, which 
was the cork-box in which she pinned her 
butterflies. She must have had a whole museum 
of ideas ! The most accidental resemblance 
between words would suffice to start one : after 
it she would go, catch it, pin it down, and call 
it a correspondence. Now and then a very 
pretty notion would fall to her net, and often 
a silly one ; but all were equally game to her. 
I found her amusing and interesting for two 
days, but then began to see she only led nothing 
nowhere She was touchy, and jealous, and 
said things that disgusted me ; never did any- 
thing for anybody; and though she hunted 
religious ideas most, never seemed to imagine 


32 


HOME AGAIN. 


they could have anything to do with her life. 
It was only the fineness of a good thought even 
that she seemed to prize. She would startle you 
any moment by an exclamation of delight at 
some religious fancy or sentimentality, and 
down it must go in her book, but it went no 
farther than her book : she was just as common 
as before, vulgar even, in her judgments of 
motives and actions. She seemed made for a 
refined and delicate woman, but not to take 
the trouble to be what she was made for. You 
told me, you know, that God makes us, but we 
have to be. She talked about afflictions as one 
might of manure: by these afflictions, of which 
she would complain bitterly, she was being 
fashioned for life eternal ! It was all the 
most dreary, noisome rubbish I had ever come 
across. I used to lie awake thinking what could 
ever rouse such a woman to see that she had 
to do something ; that man nor woman can 
become anything without having a hand in the 
matter. She seemed to expect the spirit of 


FLUTTERBIES. 33 

God to work in her like yeast in flour, although 
there was not a sign of the dough rising. That 
is how I came to see that one may have any 
number of fine thoughts and fancies and be 
nothing the better, any more than the poor 
woman in the gospel with her doctors ! And 
when Walter, the next time he came home, 
talked as he did about thoughts, and quoted 
Keats to the same effect, as if the finest thing 
in the universe were a fine thought, I could not 
bear it, and that made me speak to him as I did.” 

“You have made it very clear, Molly; and 
I quite agree with you : thinks are of no use 
except they be turned into things.” 

“But perhaps, after all, I may have been 
unfair to her ! ” said Molly. “ People are so 
queer ! They seem sometimes to be altogether 
made up of odd bits of different people. 
There’s Aunt Ann now ! she w r ould not do a 
tradesman out of a ha’penny, but she will cheat 
at backgammon ! ” 

“ I know she will, and that is why I never 


34 


HOME AGAIN. 


play with her. It is so seldom she will give 
herself any recreation, that it makes me sorry 
to refuse her.” 

“There is one thing that troubles me,” said 
Molly, after a little pause. 

“ What is it, my child ? I always like to hear 
something troubles you, for then I know you 
are going to have something. To miss is the 
preparation for receiving.” 

“I can’t care — much — about poetry — and 
Walter says such fine things about it ! Walter 
is no fool ! ” 

“ Far from one, I am glad to think ! ” said 
Richard laughing. Molly’s straight-forward, 
humble confidence, he found as delightful as 
amusing. 

“It seems to me so silly to scoff at things 
because you can’t go in for them ! I sometimes 
hear people make insulting remarks about music, 
and music I know to be a good and precious and 
lovely thing. Then I think with myself, they 
must be in the same condition with regard to 


FLUTTERBIES. 


35 


music, that I am in with regard to poetry. So I 
take care not to be a fool in talking about what 
I don’t know. That I am stupid is no reason 
for being a fool. Any one whom God has made 
stupid, has a right to be stupid, but no right to 
call others fools because they are not stupid.” 

“ I thought you liked poetry, Molly ! ” 

“ So I do when you read it, or talk about it. 
It seems as if you made your way of it grow 
my way of it. I hear the poetry and feel your 
feeling of it. But when I try to read it my- 
self, then I don’t care for it. Sometimes I turn 
it into prose, and then I get a hold of it.” 

“ That is about the best and hardest test you 
could put it to, Molly ! But perhaps you have 
been trying to like what ought not, because it 
does not deserve to be liked. There is much 
in the shape of poetry that set in gold and 
diamonds would be worth nothing.” 

“I think the difficulty is in myself. Sometimes 
I am in the fit mood, and other times not. A 
single line will now and then set something 


36 


HOME AGAIN. 


churning, churning in me, so that I cannot 
understand myself. It will make me think of 
music, and sunrise, and the wind, and the song 
of the lark, and all lovely things. But some- 
times prose will serve me the same. And the 
next minute, perhaps, either of them will be 
boring me more than I can bear ! I know it is 
my own fault, but ” 

“ Stop there, Molly ! It may sometimes be 
your own fault, but certainly not always! You 
are fastidious, little one ; and in exquisite things 
how can one be too fastidious ! — When Walter 
is gone, suppose we read a little more poetry 
together ? ” 

Richard Colman had made some money in 
one of the good farming times, but of late had 
not been increasing his store. But he was a 
man too genuinely practical to set his mind 
upon making money. 

There are parents who, notwithstanding they 
have found possession powerless for their own 


FLUTTERBIES. 37 

peace, not the less heap up for the sons 
coming after, in the weak but unquestioned 
fancy that possession will do for them what it 
could not do for their fathers and mothers. 
Richard was above such stupidity. He had 
early come to see that the best thing money 
could do for his son, was to help in preparing 
him for some work fit to employ what faculty 
had been given him, in accordance with the 
tastes also given him. He saw, the last thing 
a foolish father will see, that the best a father 
can do, is to enable his son to earn his liveli- 
hood in the exercise of a genial and righteous 
labour. He saw that possession generates arti- 
ficial and enfeebling wants, overlaying and 
smothering the God -given necessities of our 
nature, whence alone issue golden hopes and 
manly endeavours. 

He had therefore been in no haste to draw 
from his son a declaration of choice as to 
profession. When every man shall feel in him- 
self a call to this or that, and scarce needs make 


38 HOME AGAIN. 

a choice, the generations will be well served ; 
but that is not yet, and what Walter was fit for 
was not yet quite manifest It was only clear 
to the father that his son must labour for others 
with a labour, if possible, whose reflex action 
should be life to himself. Agriculture seemed 
inadequate to the full employment of the gifts 
which, whether from paternal partiality or 
genuine insight, he believed his son to possess ; 
neither had Walter shown inclination or aptitude 
for any department of it. All Richard could 
do, therefore, was to give him such preparation 
as would be fundamentally available for any 
superstructure : he might, he hoped, turn to 
medicine or the law. Partly for financial 
reasons, he sent him to Edinburgh. 

There Walter neither distinguished nor dis- 
graced himself, and developed no inclination to 
one more than another of the careers open to a 
young man of education. He read a good deal, 
however, and showed taste in literature — was in- 
deed regarded by his companions as an authority 


FLUTTERBIES. 39 

in its more imaginative ranges, and specially in 
matters belonging to verse, having an excep- 
tionally fine ear for its vocal delicacies. This 
is one of the rarest of gifts ; but rarity does not 
determine value, and Walter greatly over-estim- 
ated its relative importance. The consciousness 
of its presence had far more than a reasonable 
share in turning his thoughts to literature as a 
profession. 

When his bent became apparent, it troubled 
his father a little. He knew that to gain the 
level of excellence at which labour in that 
calling ensured the merest livelihood, required 
in most cases a severe struggle ; and for such 
effort he doubted his son’s capacity, perceiving 
in him none of the stoic strength that comes 
of a high ideal, and can encounter disappoint- 
ment, even privation, without injury. Other 
and deeper dangers the good parent did not 
see. He comforted himself that, even if things 
went no better than now, he could at least 
give his son a fair chance of discovering 


HOME AGAIN. 


40 

whether the career would suit him, and support 
him, if it did suit him, until he should attain 
the material end of it. Long before Miss 
Hancock’s attack upon his supposed indifference 
to his son’s idleness, he had made up his mind 
to let him try how far he could go in the 
way to which he was drawn ; and the next day 
told his son, to his unspeakable delight, that 
he was ready to do what lay in his power to 
further his desire ; that his own earthly life 
was precious to him only for the sake of the 
children he must by and by leave; and that 
when he saw him busy, contented, and useful, 
he would gladly yield his hold upon it. 

Walter’s imagination took fire at the pros- 
pect of realizing all he had longed for but feared 
to subject to paternal scrutiny, and he was at 
once eager to go out into the great unhomely 
world, in the hope of being soon regarded by 
his peers as the possessor of certain gifts and 
faculties which had not yet handed in their 
vouchers to himself. For, as the conscience of 


FLUTTERBIES. 


41 


many a man seems never to trouble him until the 
looks of his neighbours bring their consciences 
to bear upon his, so the mind of many a man 
seems never to satisfy him that he has a gift 
until other men grant his possession of it. 
Around Walter, nevertheless, the world broke 
at once into rare bloom. He became like 
a windy day in the house, vexing his aunt with 
his loud, foolish gladness, and causing the wise 
heart of Molly many a sudden, chilly fore- 
boding. She knew him better than his father 
knew him. His father had not played whole 
days with him, and day after day ! She knew 
that happiness made him feel strong for any- 
thing, but that his happiness was easily dashed, 
and he was then a rain-wet, wind-beaten butter- 
fly. He had no soul for bad weather. He could 
not therefore be kept in wadding, however ! He 
must have his trial ; must, in one way or another, 
encounter life, and disclose what amount of the 
real might be in him —what little, but enlarge- 
able claim he might have to manhood! 


42 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER VI. 

FROM HOME. 

Every morning, a man may say, 

Calls him up with a new birth-day ; 

Every day is a little life, 

Sunny with love, stormy with strife ; 

Every night is a little death, 

From which too soon he awakeneth — 

— as Walter himself wrote, not then knowing 
half that the words meant. As with the skirt 
of her mantle the dark wipes out the day, so 
with her sleep the night makes a man fresh 
for the new days journey. If it were not for 
sleep, the world could not go on. To feel the 
mystery of day and night, to gaze into the 
far receding spaces of their marvel, is more 
than to know all the combinations of chemistry. 
A little wonder is worth tons of knowledge. 


FROM HOME. 


43 


But to Walter the new day did not come as a 
call to new life in the world of will and action, 
but only as the harbinger of a bliss borne 
hitherward on the wind of the world. Was 
he not going forth as a Titanic child to be- 
come a great man amongst great men ! Who 
would be strong among the weak ! who would 
be great among the small ! He did not sus- 
pect in himself what Molly saw, or at least 
suspected in him. When a man is hopeful, he 
feels strong, and can work. The thoughts come 
and the pen runs. W T ere he always at his best, 
what might not a man do ! But not many 
can determine their moods ; and none, be they 
poets or economists, can any more secure the 
conditions of faculty than they can create the 
faculty. When the mood changes and hope 
departs, and the inward atmosphere is grown 
damp and dismal, there may be whose imagina- 
tion will yet respond to their call ; but let some 
certain kind of illness come, and every one 
must lose his power ; his creature-condition 


44 


HOME AGAIN. 


will assert itself ; he is compelled to discover 
that we did not create ourselves, neither live 
by ourselves. 

Walter loved his father, but did not mind 
leaving him ; he loved Molly, but did not mind 
leaving her ; and we cannot blame him if he 
was glad to escape from his aunt. If people are 
not lovable, it takes a saint to love them, or at 
least one who is not afraid of them. Yet it was 
with a sense of somewhat dreary though welcome 
liberty, that Walter found himself, but for the 
young man his father had befriended, alone in 
London. With his help he found a humble 
lodging not far from the British Museum, to the 
neighbourhood of which his love of books led 
him ; and for a time, feeling no necessity for 
immediate effort, he gave himself to the study 
of certain departments of our literature not 
hitherto within his easy reach. In the evening 
he would write, or accompany his new friend to 
some lecture or amusement ; and so the weeks 
passed. To earn something seemed but a slowly 


FROM HOME. 


45 


approaching necessity, and the weeks grew to 
months. He was never idle, for his tastes were 
strong, and he had delight in his pen ; but so 
sensitive was his social skin, partly from the lick- 
ing of his aunt’s dry, feline tongue, that he shrank 
from submitting anything he wrote to Harold 
Sullivan, who, a man of firmer and more world- 
capable stuff than he, would at least have shown 
him how things which the author saw and judged 
from the inner side of the web, must appear on 
the other side. There are few weavers of 
thought capable of turning round the web and 
contemplating with unprejudiced regard the side 
of it about to be offered to the world, so as to 
perceive how it will look to eyes alien to its 
genesis. 

It would be to repeat a story often told, to 
relate how he sent poem after poem, now to 
this now to that periodical, with the same result 
— that he never heard of them again. The 
verses over which he had laboured with delight, 
in the crimson glory they reflected on the heart 


46 


HOME AGAIN. 


whence they issued, were nothing in any eyes 
to which he submitted them. In truth, except 
for a good line here and there, they were by no 
means on the outer side what they looked to 
him on the inner. He read them in the light 
of the feeling in which he had written them ; 
whoever else read them had not this light to 
interpret them by, had no correspondent mood 
ready to receive them. It was the business of 
the verse itself, by witchery of sound and magic 
of phrase, to rouse receptive mood : of this it 
was incapable. A course of reading in the first 
attempts of such as rose after to well merited 
distinction, might reveal not a few things — 
among the rest, their frequent poverty. Much 
mere babbling often issues before worthy speech 
begins. There was nothing in Walter’s mind to 
be put in form except a few of the vague lovely 
sensations belonging to a poetic temperament. 
And as he grew more and more of a reader, his 
inspiration came more and more from what he 
read, less and less from knowledge of his own 


FROM HOME. 


47 


heart or the hearts of others. He had no 
revelation to give. He had, like most of our 
preachers, set out to run before he could walk, 
begun to cry aloud before he had any truth to 
utter; to teach, or at least to interest others, 
before he was himself interested in others. Now 
and then, indeed, especially when some fading 
joy of childhood gleamed up, words would come 
unbidden, and he would throw off a song desti- 
tute neither of feeling nor music ; but this kind 
of thing he scarcely valued, for it seemed to cost 
him nothing. 

He comforted himself by concluding that his 
work was of a kind too original to be at once 
recognized by dulled and sated editors ; that he 
must labour on and keep sending. 

“Why do you not write something?” his 
friend would say ; and he would answer that 
his time was not come. 

The friends he made were not many. In- 
stinctively he shrank from what was coarse, 
feeling it destructive to every finer element. 


48 


HOME AGAIN. 


How could he write of beauty, if, false to beauty, 
he had but for a moment turned to the unclean ? 
But he was not satisfied with himself : he had 
done nothing, even in his own eyes, while the 
recognition of the world was lacking ! 

He was in no anxiety, for he did not imagine 
it of consequence to his father whether he 
began a little sooner or a little later to earn. 
The governor knew, he said to himself, that to 
earn ought not to be a man’s first object in life, 
even when necessity compelled him to make it 
first in order of time, which was not the case 
with him ! But he did not ask himself whether 
he had substituted a better object. A greater 
man than himself, he reflected — no less a man, 
indeed, than Milton — had never earned a dinner 
till after he was thirty years of age ! He did 
not consider how and to what ends Milton had 
all the time been diligent. He was no student 
yet of men’s lives ; he was interested almost 
only in their imaginations, and not half fastidious 
enough as to whether those imaginations ran 


FROM HOME. 


49 


upon the rails of truth or not. He was rapidly 
filling his mind with the good and bad of the 
literature of his country, but he had not yet 
gone far in distinguishing between the bad and 
the good in it. Books were to him the geo- 
logical deposits of literary forces. He pursued 
his acquaintance with them to nourish the 
literary faculty in himself. They afforded him 
atmosphere and stimulant, and store of matter. 
He was in full training for the profession that 
cultivates literature for and upon literature, and 
neither for nor upon truth. 


50 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER VII 

A CHANGE. 

A BIG stone fell suddenly into the smooth 
pool of Walter’s conditions. A letter from his 
father brought the news that the bank where 
he had deposited his savings had proved but 
a swollen mushroom. He had lost all. 

“ Indeed, my son,” wrote the sorrowful 
Richard, “ I do not see how with honesty to 
send you a shilling more ! If you have ex- 
hausted the proceeds of my last cheque, and 
cannot earn a sufficiency, come home. Thank 
God, the land yet remains ! — so long as I can 
pay the rent.” 

In the heart of Walter woke a new impulse. 
He drew himself up for combat and endurance. 


A CHANGE. 


51 


I am afraid he did not feel much trouble for his 
father’s trouble, but he would have scorned 
adding to it. He wrote at once that he must 
not think of him in the affair ; he would do very 
well. It was not a comforting letter exactly, 
but it showed courage, and his father was glad. 

He set himself to find employment in some 
one of the mechanical departments of literature 
- — the only region in which he could think to 
do anything. When the architect comes to 
necessity, it is well if stones are near, and the 
mason’s hammer : if he be not the better mason 
that he is an architect, alas for his architecture ! 
Walter was nothing yet, however, neither 
architect nor mason, when the stern hand of 
necessity laid hold of him. But it is a fine 
thing for any man to be compelled to work. 
It is the first divine decree, issuing from love 
and help. How would it have been with Adam 
and Eve had they been left to plenty and 
idleness, the voice of God no more heard in the 
cool of the day ? 


52 


HOME AGAIN. 


But the search for work was a difficult and 
disheartening task. He who has encountered it, 
however, has had an experience whose value far 
more than equals its unpleasantness. A man 
out of work needs the God that cares for the 
sparrows, as much as the man whose heart is 
torn with ingratitude, or crushed under a secret 
crime. Walter went hither and thither, com- 
municated his quest to each of his few acquaint- 
ances, procured introductions, and even without 
any applied to some who might have employ- 
ment to bestow, putting so much pride in his 
pockets that, had it been a solid, they must have 
bulged in unsightly fashion, and walked till 
worn with weariness, giving good proof that he 
was no fool, but had the right stuff in him. 
He neither yielded to false fastidiousness, nor 
relaxed effort because of disappointment — not 
even when disappointment became the very at- 
mosphere of his consciousness. To the father it 
would have been the worst of his loss to see his 
son wiping the sweat and dust from the forehead 


A CHANGE. 


53 


his mother had been so motherly proud of, and 
hear the heavy sigh with which he would sink 
in the not too easy chair that was all his haven 
after the tossing of the day’s weary ground- 
swell. He did not rise quite above self-pity ; 
he thought he was hardly dealt with ; but so 
long as he did not respond to the foolish and 
weakening sentiment by relaxation of effort, it 
could not do him much harm ; he would soon 
grow out of it, and learn to despise it. What 
one man has borne, why should not another 
bear ? Why should it be unfit for him any more 
than the other ? Certainly he who has never 
borne has yet to bear. The new experience is 
awaiting every member of the Dives clan. 
Walter wore out his shoes, and could not buy 
another pair; his clothes grew shabby, and he 
must wear them : it was no small part of his 
suffering, to have to show himself in a guise 
which made him so unlike the Walter he felt. 
But he did not let his father know even a 
small part of what he confronted. 


54 


HOME AGAIN. 


He had never drawn close to his father ; they 
had come to no spiritual contact. Walter, the 
gentleman, saw in Richard the farmer. He 
knew him an honourable man, and in a way 
honoured him ; but he would have been dis- 
satisfied with him in such society to which he 
considered himself belonging. It is a sore 
thing for a father, when he has shoved his son 
up a craggy steep, to see him walk away with- 
out looking behind. Walter felt a difference 
between them. 

He had to give up his lodging. Sullivan 
took him into his, and shared his bed with 
him — doing all he could in return for his father’s 
kindness. 

Where now was Walter’s poetry ? Naturally, 
vanished. He was man enough to work, but 
not man enough to continue a poet. His 
poetry ! — how could such a jade stand the spur ! 

But to bestir himself was better than to make 
verses ; and indeed of all the labours for a live- 
lihood in which a man may cultivate verse, that 


A CHANGE. 55 

of literature is the last he should choose. Com- 
pare the literary efforts of Burns with the songs 
he wrote when home from his plough ! 

Walter’s hope had begun to faint outright, 
when Sullivan came in one evening as he lay on 
the floor, and told him that the editor of a new 
periodical, whom he had met at a friend’s house, 
would make a place for him. The remuneration 
could suffice only to a grinding economy, but it 
was bread ! — more, it was work, and an opening 
to possibilities ! Walter felt himself equal to 
any endurance short of incapacitating hunger, 
and gladly accepted the offer. His duty was 
the merest agglomeration ; but even in that he 
might show faculty, and who could tell what 
might follow ! It was wearisome but not 
arduous, and above all, it left him time 1 


56 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

AT WORK. 

Walter found that compulsory employment, 
while taking from his time for genial labour, 
quickened his desire after it, increased his faculty 
for it, and made him more careful of his precious 
hours of leisure. Life, too, had now an interest 
greater than before ; and almost as soon as 
anxiety gave place, the impulse to utterance 
began again to urge him. Whatlhis impulse is, 
who can define, or who can trace its origin ? 
The result of it in Walter’s case was ordered 
words, or, conventionally, poetry. Seldom is 
such a result of any value, but the process is 
for the man invaluable : it remained to be seen 
whether in Walter it was for others as well as 
himself. 


AT WORK. 


5 7 


He became rapidly capable of better work. 
His duty was drudgery, but drudgery well 
encountered will reveal itself as of potent and 
precious reaction, both intellectual and moral. 
One incapable of drudgery cannot be capable of 
the finest work. Many a man may do many 
things well, and be far from reception into the 
most ancient guild of workers. 

Walter laboured with conscience and diligence, 
and brought his good taste to tell on the quality 
of his drudgery. He is a contemptible workman 
who thinks of his claims before his duties, of his 
poor wages instead of his undertaken work. 
There was a strong sense of fairness in Walter ; 
he saw the meanness of pocketing the poorest 
wages without giving good work in return ; he 
saw that its own badness, and nothing else, makes 
any work mean — and the workman with it. 
That he believed himself capable of higher work 
was the worst of reasons for not giving money’s 
worth for his money. That a thing is of little 
value is a poor excuse for giving bad measure 


53 HOME AGAIN. 

of it. Walter carried his hod full, and was a 
man. 

Sullivan was mainly employed in writing the 
reviews of “ current literature.” One evening he 
brought Walter a book of some pretension, told 
him he was hard pressed, and begged him to 
write a notice of it. Walter, glad of the oppor- 
tunity of both serving his friend and trying his 
own hand, set himself at once to read the book. 
The moment he thus took the attitude of a 
reviewer, he found the paragraphs begin, like 
potatoes, to sprout, and generate other para- 
graphs. Between agreeing and disagreeing he 
had soon far more than enough to say, and 
sought his table, as a workman his bench. 

To many people who think, writing is the 
greatest of bores ; but Walter enjoyed it, even 
to the mechanical part of the operation. Heedless 
of the length of his article, he wrote until long 
after midnight, and next morning handed the 
result to his friend. He burst out laughing. 

“ Here’s a paper for a quarterly ! ” he cried. 


AT WORK. 


59 

“Man, it is almost as long as the book itself! 
This will never do ! The world has neither 
time, space, money, nor brains for so much ! 
But I will take it, and see what can be done 
with it.” 

About a sixth part of it was printed. In that 
sixth Walter could not recognize his hand ; 
neither could he have gathered from it any idea 
of the book. 

A few days after, Harold brought him a batch 
of books to review, taking care, however, to limit 
him to an average length for each. Walter 
entered thus upon a short apprenticeship, the 
end of which was that, a vacancy happening to 
occur, he was placed on “the staff” of the journal, 
to aid in reviewing the books sent by their 
publishers. His income was considerably aug- 
mented, but the work was harder, and required 
more of his time. 

From the first he was troubled to find how 
much more honesty demanded than pay made 
possible. He had not learned this while merely 


3 


6o 


HOME AGAIN. 


supplementing the labour of his friend, and 
taking his time. But now he became aware 
that to make acquaintance with a book, and 
pass upon it a justifiable judgment, required at 
least four times the attention he could afford it 
and live. Many, however, he could knock off 
without compunction, regarding them as too. 
slight to deserve attention : “ indifferent honest,” 
he was not so sensitive in justice as to reflect 
that the poorest thing has a right to fair play ; 
that, free to say nothing, you must, if you 
speak, say the truth of the meanest. But Walter 
had not yet sunk to believe there can be necessity 
for doing wrong. The world is divided, very 
unequally, into those that think a man cannot 
avoid, and those who believe he must avoid 
doing wrong. Those live in fear of death; these 
set death in one eye and right in the other. 

His first important review, Walter was com- 
pelled to print without having finished it. The 
next he worked at harder, and finished, but with 
less deliberation. He grew more and more 


AT WORK. 


6 1 


careless toward the books he counted of little 
consequence, while he imagined himself growing 
more and more capable of getting at the heart 
of a book by skimming its pages. If to skim 
be ever a true faculty, it must come of long 
experience in the art of reading, and is not 
possible to a beginner. To skim and judge, is 
to wake from a doze and give the charge to 
a jury. 

Writing more and more smartly, he found the 
usual difficulty in abstaining from a smartness 
which was unjust because irrelevant 

So far as his employers were concerned, 
Walter did his duty, but forgot that, apart from 
his obligation to the mere and paramount truth, 
it was from the books he reviewed — good, bad, 
or indifferent, whichever they were — that he 
drew the food he ate and the clothes that covered 
him. 

His talent was increasingly recognized by the 
editors of the newspaper, and they began to put 
other, and what they counted more important 


62 


HOME AGAIN. 


work in his way, intrusting him with the dis- 
cussion of certain social questions of the day, in 
regard to which, like many another youth of 
small experience, he found it the easier to give 
a confident opinion that his experience was so 
small. In general he wrote logically, and, which 
is rarer, was even capable of being made to see 
where his logic was wrong. But his premises 
were much too scanty. What he took for 
granted was very often by no means granted. It 
mattered little to editors or owners, however, so 
long as he wrote lucidly, sparklingly, '* crisply,” 
leaving those who read willing to read more 
from the same pea 


( 63 } 


CHAPTER IX. 

FLATTERY. 

WITHIN a year Walter began to be known — to 
the profession, at least — as a promising writer ; 
and was already, to more than a few, personally 
known as a very agreeable, gentlemanly fellow, 
so that in the following season he had a good 
many invitations. It was by nothing beyond 
the ephemeral that he was known ; but may 
not the man who has invented a good umbrella 
one day build a good palace ? 

His acquaintance was considerably varied, 
but of the social terraces above the professional, 
he knew for a time nothing. 

One evening, however, he happened to meet, 
and was presented to lady Tremaine: she had 


6 4 


HOME AGAIN. 


asked to have the refined-looking young man, of 
whom she had just heard as one of the principal 
writers in the Field Battery , introduced to her. 
She was a matronly, handsome woman, with 
cordial manners and a cold eye ; frank, easy, 
confident, unassuming. Under the shield of her 
position, she would walk straight up to any 
subject, and speak her mind of it plainly. It 
was more than easy to become acquainted with 
her when she chose. 

The company was not a large one, and they 
soon found themselves alone in a quiet corner. 

“You are a celebrated literary man, Mr. Col- 
man, they tell me ! ” said lady Tremaine. 

“ Not in the least,” answered Walter. “ I am 
but a poor hack.” 

“ It is well to be modest ; but I am not bound 
to take your description of yourself. Your class 
at least is in a fair way to take the lead ! ” 

“In what, pray?” 

“ In politics, in society, in everything.” 

“Your ladyship cannot think it desirable.” 


FLATTERY. 65 

“ I do not pretend to desire it. I am not false 
to my own people. But the fact remains that 
you are coming to the front, and we are falling 
behind. And the sooner you get to the front, the 
better it will be for the world, and for us too.” 

“ I cannot say I understand you.” 

“ I will tell you why. There are now no fewer 
than three aristocracies. There is one of rank, 
and one of brains. I belong to the one, you to 
the other. But there is a third.” 

“ If you recognize the rich as an aristocracy, 
you must allow me to differ from you — very 
much ! ” 

“Naturally. I quite agree with you. But 
what can your opinion and mine avail against 
the rising popular tide ! All the old families are 
melting away, swallowed by the noiiveaux riches. 
I should not mind, or at least I should feel it in 
me to submit with a good grace, if we were 
pushed from our stools by a new aristocracy of 
literature and science, but I do rebel against 
the social regime which is every day more 


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strongly asserting itself. All the gradations are 
fast disappearing; the palisades of good man- 
ners, dignity, and respect, are vanishing with the 
hedges; the country is positively inundated with 
slang and vulgarity — all from the ill-breeding, 
presumption, and self-satisfaction of new people.” 

Walter felt tempted to ask whether it was not 
the fault of the existent aristocracy in receiving 
and flattering them ; whether it could not 
protect society if it would ; whether in truth 
the aristocracy did not love, even honour money 
as much as they ; but he was silent. 

As if she read his thought, lady Tremaine 
resumed : — 

“ The plague of it is that younger sons must 
live ! Money they must have ! — and there’s the 
gate off the hinges ! The best, and indeed the 
only thing to help is, that the two other arist- 
ocracies make common cause to keep the rich 
in their proper place.” 

It was not a very subtle flattery, but Walter 
was pleased. The lady saw she had so far 


FLATTERY. 


67 

gained her end, for she had an t * n v j eW) anc j 
changed the subject. 

“You go out of an evening, I see!” she said 
at length. “ I am glad. Some authors will not.” 

“ I do when I can. The evening, however, to 
one who — who ” 

“ — has an eye on posterity ! Of course ! It 
is gold and diamonds ! How silly all our pur- 
suits must appear in your eyes ! But I hope 
you will make an exception in my favour ! ” 

“I shall be most happy,” responded Walter 
cordially. 

“ I will not ask you to come and be absorbed 
in a crowd — not the first time at least ! Could 
you not manage to come and see me in the 
morning ? ” 

“I am at your ladyship’s service,” replied 
Walter. 

“Then come — let me see! — the day after to- 
morrow — about five o’clock. — 17, Goodrich- 
square.” 

Walter could not but be flattered that lady 


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HOME AGAIN. 


Tremaine wa= ^ evidently pleased with him. 
one called his profession an aristocracy too ! 
therefore she was not patronizing him, but 
receiving him on the same social level ! We 
cannot blame him for the inexperience which 
allowed him to hold his head a little higher as 
he walked home. 

There was little danger of his forgetting the 
appointment. Lady Tremaine received him in 
what she called her growlery, with cordiality. 
By and by she led the way toward literature, 
and after they had talked of several new 
books — 

“ We are not in this house altogether strange,” 
she said, “to your profession. My daughter 
Lufa is an authoress in her way. You, of course, 
never heard of her, but it is twelve months since 
her volume of verse came out.” 

Surely Walter had, somewhere about that 
time, when helping his friend Sullivan, seen a 
small ornate volume of verses, with a strange 
name like that on the title-page ! Whether 


FLATTERY. 69 

he had written a notice of it he could not 
remember. 

“ It was exceedingly well received — for a first, 
of course ! Lufa hardly thought so herself, but 
I told her what could she expect, altogether 
unknown as she was. Tell me honestly, Mr. 
Colman, is there not quite as much jealousy in 
your profession as in any other ? ” 

Walter allowed it was not immaculate in 
respect of envy and evil speaking. 

“You have so much opportunity for revenge, 
you see ! ” said lady Tremaine ; “ — and such a 
coat of darkness for protection ! With a few 
strokes of the pen a man may ruin his 
rival ! ” 

“ Scarcely that ! ” returned Walter. “If a 
book be a good book, the worst of us cannot do 
it much harm ; nor do I believe there are more 
than a few in the profession who would con- 
descend to give a false opinion upon the work 
of a rival ; though doubtless personal feeling 
may pervert the judgment.” 


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HOME AGAIN. 


“ That, of course,” returned the lady, “ is 
but human ! You cannot deny, however, that 
authors occasionally make furious assaults on 
each other ! ” 

“Authors ought not to be reviewers,” replied 
Walter. “I fancy most reviewers avoid the 
work of an acquaintance even, not to say a 
friend or enemy.” 

The door opened, and what seemed to Walter 
as lovely a face as could ever have dawned on 
the world, peeped in, and would have with- 
drawn. 

“ Lufa,” said lady Tremaine, “you need not 
go away. Mr. Colman and I have no secrets. 
Come and be introduced to him.” 

She entered — a small, pale creature, below 
the middle height, with the daintiest figure, and 
childlike eyes of dark blue, very clear, and — 
must I say it ? — for the occasion “ worn ” wide. 
Her hair was brown, on the side of black, 
divided in the middle, and gathered behind in a 
great mass. Her dress was something white, 


FLATTERY. 


71 


with a shimmer of red about it, and a blush-rose 
in the front. She greeted Walter in the 
simplest, friendliest way, holding out her tiny 
hand very frankly. Her features were no 
smaller than for her size they ought to be, 
in themselves perfect, Walter thought, and in 
harmony with her whole being and carriage. 
Her manner was a gentle, unassuming assurance 
— almost as if they knew each other, but had 
not met for some time. Walter felt some 
ancient primeval bond between them — dim, but 
indubitable. 

The mother withdrew to her writing-table, 
and began to write, now and then throwing in 
a word as they talked. Lady Lufa seemed 
pleased with her new acquaintance ; Walter 
was bewitched. Bewitchment I take to be the 
approach of the real to our ideal. Perhaps 
upon that, however, depends even the comfort- 
ing or the restful. In the heart of every one 
lies the necessity for homeliest intercourse with 
the perfectly lovely; we are made for it. Yet 


?2 HOME AGAIN. 

so far are we in ourselves from the ideal, which 
no man can come near until absolutely devoted 
to its quest, that we continually take that for 
sufficing which is a little beyond. 

“ I think, Mr. Colman, I have seen something 
of yours ! — You do put your name to what you 
write ? ” said lady Lufa. 

“Not always,” replied Walter. 

“ I think the song must have been yours ! ” 

Walter had, just then, for the first time pub- 
lished a thing of his own. That it should 
have arrested the eye of this lovely creature! 
He acknowledged that he had printed a trifle 
in The Observatory. 

“ I was charmed with it ! ” said the girl, the 
word charmingly drawled. 

“ The merest trifle ! ” remarked Walter. “ It 
cost me nothing.” 

He meant what he said, unwilling to be 
judged by such a slight thing. 

“That is the beauty of it!” she answered. 
“Your song left your soul as the thrush’s leaves 


FLATTERY. 73 

his throat ! Should we prize the thrush’s more 
if we came upon him practising it ? ” 

Walter laughed. 

“ But we are not meant to sing like the 
birds ! ” 

“That you could write such a song without 
effort, shows you to possess the bird-gift of 
spontaneity.” 

Walter was surprised at her talk, and willing 
to believe it profound. 

“The will and the deed in one may be the 
highest art ! ” he said. “ I hardly know.” 

“ May I write music to it ? ” asked lady Lufa, 
with upward glance, sweet smile, and gently 
apologetic look. 

“ I am delighted you should think of doing 
so. It is more than it deserves ! ” answered 
Walter. “ My only condition is, that you will 
let me hear it.” 

“ That you have a right to. Besides, I dared 
not publish it without knowing you liked it.” 

u Thank you so much ! To hear you sing it 


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HOME AGAIN. 


will let me know at once whether the song 
itself be genuine.” 

“ No, no ! I may fail in my part, and yours 
be all I take it to be. But I shall not fail. It 
holds me too fast for that ! ” 

“ Then I may hope for a summons ? ” said 
Walter, rising. 

“Before long. One cannot order the mood, 
you know i ” 


CHAPTER X. 


THE ROUND OF THE WORLD. 

Birds when they leave the nest, carry, 1 
presume, their hearts with them ; not a few 
humans leave their hearts behind them — too 
often, alas ! to be sent for afterwards. The 
whole round of the world, many a cloudrack on 
the ridge of it, and many a mist on the top of 
that, rises between them and the eyes and hearts 
which gave their very life that they might live. 
Some as they approach middle age, some only 
when they are old, wake up to understand that 
they have parents. To some the perception 
comes with their children ; to others with the 
pang of seeing them walk away light-hearted 
out into the world, as they themselves turned 
their backs on their parents : they had been all 


y6 HOME AGAIN. 

their own, and now they have done with them ! 
Less or more have we not all thus taken our 
journey into a far country? But many a man 
of sixty is more of a son to the father gone from 
the earth, than he was while under his roof. 
What a disintegrated mass were the world, what 
a lump of half-baked brick, if death were indeed 
the end of affection ! if there were no chance 
more of setting right what was so wrong in the 
loveliest relations ! How gladly would many a 
son who once thought it a weariness to serve his 
parents, minister now to their lightest need ! 
and in the boundless eternity is there no help ? 

Walter was not a prodigal ; he was a well- 
behaved youth. He was only proud, only 
thought much of himself ; was only pharisaical, 
not hypocritical ; was only neglectful of those 
nearest him, always polite to those comparatively 
nothing to him ! Compassionate and generous 
to necessity, he let his father and his sister-cousin 
starve for the only real food a man can give, 
that is, himself. As to him who thought his 


THE ROUND OF THE WORLD. 


77 


very thoughts into him, he heeded him not at 
all, or mocked him by merest ceremony. There 
are who refuse God the draught of water he 
desires, on the ground that their vessel is not fit 
for him to drink from : Walter thought his too 
good to fill with the water fit for God to drink. 

He had the feeling, far from worded, not even 
formed, but certainly in him, that he was a 
superior man to his father. But it is a funda- 
mental necessity of the kingdom of heaven, 
impossible as it must seem to all outside it, that 
each shall count other better than himself ; it is 
the natural condition of the man God made, in 
relation to the other men God has made. Man 
is made, not to contemplate himself, but to 
behold in others the beauty of the Father. A 
man who lives to meditate upon and worship 
himself, is in the slime of hell. Walter knew 
his father a reading man, but because he had 
not been to a university, placed no value on 
his reading. Yet this father was a man who 
had intercourse with high countries, intercourse 


78 HOME AGAIN. 

in which his son would not have perceived the 
presence of an idea. 

In like manner, Richard’s carriage cf mind, 
and the expression of the same in his modes 
and behaviour, must have been far other than 
objectionable to the ushers of those high 
countries ; his was a certain quiet, simple, direct 
way, reminding one of Nathanael, in whom was 
no guile. In another man Walter would have 
called it bucolic ; in his father he shut his 
eyes to it as well as he could, and was 
ashamed of it. He would scarcely, in his circle, 
be regarded as a gentleman ! he would look 
odd ! He therefore had not encouraged the 
idea of his coming to see him. He was not 
satisfied with the father by whom the Father 
of fathers had sent him into the world! But 
Richard was the truest of gentlemen even in 
his outward carriage, for he was not only 
courteous and humble, but that rare thing 
— natural ; and the natural, be it old as the 
Greek must be beautiful. The natural dwells 


THE ROUND OF THE WORLD. 79 

deep, and is not the careless, any more than the 
studied or assumed. 

Walter loved his father, but the root of his 
love did not go deep enough to send aloft a 
fine flower : deep in is high out. He seldom 
wrote, and wrote briefly. He did not make a 
confidant of his father. He did not even tell 
him what he was doing, or what he hoped to do. 
He might mention a success, but of hopes, fears, 
aspirations, or defeats, of thoughts or desires, he 
said nothing. As to his theories, he never 
imagined his father entering into such things as 
occupied his mind ! The ordinary young man 
takes it for granted that he and the world are 
far ahead of “ the governor ; ” the father may 
have left behind him, as nebulae sinking below 
the horizon of youth, questions the world is but 
just waking to put. 

The blame, however, may lie in part at the 
parent’s door. The hearts of the fathers need 
turning to the children, as much as the hearts 
of the children need turning to the fathers. Few 


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men open up to their children ; and where a 
man does not, the schism, the separation begins 
with him, for all his love be deep and true. 
That it is unmanly to show one’s feelings, is a 
superstition prevalent with all English-speaking 
people. Now, wherever feeling means weakness, 
falsehood, or excitement, it ought not merely not 
to be shown, but not to exist ; but for a man to 
hide from his son his loving and his loathing, is 
to refuse him the divinest fashion of teaching. 
Richard read the best things, and loved best the 
best writers : never once had he read a poem 
with his son, or talked to him about any poet ! 
If Walter had even suspected his father’s insight 
into certain things, he would have loved him 
more. Closely bound as they were, neither knew 
the other. Each would have been astonished at 
what he might have found in the other. The 
father might have discovered many handles by 
which to lay hold of his son ; the son might 
have seen the lamp bright in his father’s chamber 
which he was but trimming in his. 


C 81 ) 


CHAPTER XL 

THE SONG. 

At length came the summons from lady Lufa 
to hear her music to his verses. 

It was not much of a song, neither did he 
think it was. 

Mist and vapour and cloud 
Filled the earth and the air ! 

My heart was wrapt in a shroud, 

And death was everywhere. 

The sun went silently down 

To his rest in the unseen wave ; 

But my heart, in its purple and crown, 

Lay already in its grave. 

For a cloud had darkened the brow 
Of the lady who is my queen ; 

I had been a monarch, but now 
All things had only been ! 


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I sprang from the couch of death : 

Who called my soul ? Who spake ? 

No sound ! no answer! no breath ! 

Yet my soul was wide awake! 

And my heart began to blunder 
Into rhythmic pulse the while ; 

I turned — away was the wonder— 

My queen had begun to smile 1 

Outbrake the sun in the west ! 

Outlaughed the crested sea ! 

And my heart was alive in my breast 
With light, and love, and thee ! 

There was a little music in the verses, and 
they had a meaning — though not a very new 
or valuable one. 

He went in the morning — the real, not the 
conventional — and was shown into the drawing- 
room, his heart beating with expectation. Lady 
Lufa was alone, and already at the piano. She 
was in a grey stuff with red rosebuds, and looked 
as simple as any country parson’s daughter. She 
gave him no greeting beyond a little nod, at 
once struck a chord or two, and began to sing. 

Walter was charmed. The singing, and the 


THE SONG. 


«3 


song through the singing, altogether exceeded 
his expectation. He had feared he should not 
be able to laud heartily, for he had not lost 
his desire to be truthful — but she was an 
artist! There was indeed nothing original in 
her music ; it was mainly a reconstruction of 
common phrases afloat in the musical atmos- 
phere ; but she managed the slight dramatic ele- 
ment in the lyric with taste and skill, following 
tone and sentiment with chord and inflection ; 
so that the music was worthy of the verses — 
which is not saying very much for either ; while 
the expression the girl threw into the song went 
^to the heart of the youth, and made him 
foolish. 

She ceased ; he was silent for a moment, 
then fervent in thanks and admiration. 

“ The verses are mine no more,” he said. “ I 
shall care for them now ! ** 

“You won’t mind if I publish them with the 
music? ” 

“ I shall feel more honoured than I dare tell 


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you. But how am I to go to my work after 
this taste of paradise ! It was too cruel of you, 
lady Lufa, to make me come in the morning ! ” 

“ I am very sorry ! ” 

“Will you grant me one favour to make 
up ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“Never to sing the song to any one when 
I am present I could not bear it.” 

“ I promise,” she answered, looking up in 
his face with a glance of sympathetic conscious- 
ness. 

There was an acknowledged secret between 
them, and Walter hugged it. & 

“ I gave you a frozen bird,” he said, “ and you 
have warmed it, and made it soar and sing.” 

“ Thank you ; a very pretty compliment ! ” 
she answered — and there was a moment’s 
silence. 

“ I am so glad we know each other ! ” she 
resumed. “You could help me so much if 
you would ! Next time you come, you must 


THE SONG. 85 

tell me something about those old French 
rimes that have come into fashion of late ! 
They say a pretty thing so much more prettily 
for their quaint, antique, courtly liberty! The 
triolet now — how deliciously impertinent it is ! — 
Is it not ? ” 

Walter knew nothing about the old French 
modes of versifying ; and, unwilling to place 
himself at a disadvantage, made an evasive 
reply, and went. But when at length he reached 
home, it was with several ancient volumes, 
among the rest Clement Marot , in pockets and 
hands. Ere an hour was over, he was in 
delight with the variety of dainty modes in 
which, by shape and sound, a very pretty French 
something was carved out of nothing at all. 
Their fantastic surprises, the ring of their bell- 
like returns upon themselves, their music of 
triangle and cymbal, gave him quite a new 
pleasure. In some of them poetry seemed to 
approach the nearest possible to bird-song — to 
unconscious seeming through most conscious 


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art, imitating the carelessness and impromptu of 
warblings as old as the existence of birds, and 
as new as every fresh individual joy ; for each 
new generation grows its own feathers, and 
sings its own song, yet always the feathers of 
its kind, and the song of its kind. 

The same night he sent her the following 
triolet . 

Oh, why is the moon 
Awake when thou sleepest ? 

To the nightingale’s tune. 

Why is the moon 
Making a noon, 

When night is the deepest? 

Why is the moon 
Awake when thou sleepest ? 

In the evening came a little note, with a 
coronet on the paper, but neither date nor 
signature : — 

“ Perfectly delicious ! How can such a little 
gem hold so much colour? Thank you a 
thousand times ! ” 


( 8 , 7 ) 


CHAPTER XII. 

LOVE. 

By this Walter was in love with lady Lufa. 
He said as much to himself, at least ; and in 
truth he was almost possessed with her. Every 
thought that rose in his mind began at once 
to drift toward her. Every hour of the day 
had a rose-tinge from the dress in which he 
first saw her. 

One might write a long essay on this they 
call love, and yet contribute little to the under- 
standing of it in the individual case. Its kind 
is to be interpreted after the kind of person who 
loves. There are as many hues and shades, 
not to say forms and constructions of love, as 
there are human countenances, human hearts, 


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HOME AGAIN. 


human judgments and schemes of life. Walter 
had not been an impressionable youth, because 
he had an imagination which both made him 
fastidious, and stood him in stead of falling in 
love. When a man can give form to the things 
that move in him, he is less driven to fall in 
love. But now Walter saw everything through 
a window, and the window was the face of 
Lufa. His thinking was always done in the 
presence and light of that window. She seemed 
an intrinsic component of every one of his 
mental operations. In every beauty and attrac- 
tion of life he saw her. He was possessed by 
her, almost as some are possessed by evil spirits. 
And to be possessed, even by a human being, 
may be to take refuge in the tombs, there to 
cry, and cut one’s self with fierce thoughts. 

But not yet was Walter troubled. He lived 
in love’s eternal present, and did not look for- 
ward. Even jealousy had not yet begun to 
show itself in any shape. He was not in lady 
Lufa’s set, and therefore not much drawn to 


LOVE. 


89 


conjecture what might be going on. In the 
glamour of literary ambition, he took for 
granted that lady Lufa allotted his world a 
higher orbit than that of her social life, and 
prized most the pleasures they had in common, 
which so few were capable of sharing. 

She had indeed in her own circle never found 
one who knew more of the refinements of verse 
than a school-girl does of Beethoven ; and it 
was a great satisfaction to her to know one who 
not merely recognized her proficiency, but could 
guide her farther into the depths of an art 
which every one thinks he understands, and 
only one here and there does. It was therefore 
a real welcome she was able to give him when 
they met, as they did again and again during 
the season. How much she cared for him, how 
much she would have been glad to do for him, 
my reader shall judge for himself. I think she 
cared for him very nearly as much as for a 
dress made to her liking. An injustice from 
him would have brought the tears into her eyes. 


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A poem he disapproved of she would have 
thrown aside, perhaps into the fire. 

She did not, however, submit much of her 
work to his judgment. She was afraid of what 
might put her out of heart with it. Before 
making his acquaintance, she had a fresh volume, 
a more ambitious one, well on its way, but 
fearing lack of his praise, had said nothing to 
him about it. And besides this diffidence, she 
did not wish to appear to solicit from him a 
good review. She might cast herself on his 
mercy, but it should not be confessedly. She 
had pride though not conscience in the matter. 
The mother was capable of begging, not the 
daughter. She might use fascination, but never 
entreaty ; that would be to degrade herself ! 

Walter had, of course, taken a second look at 
her volume. It did not reveal that he had said 
of it what was not true ; but he did see that, 
had he been anxious to praise, he might have 
found passages to -commend, or in which, at 
least, he could have pointed out merit. But no 


LOVE. 


91 


allusion was made to the book, on the one hand 
because lady Lufa was aware he had written 
the review, and on the other because Walter did 
not wish to give his opinion of it. He placed 
it in the category of first works ; and, knowing 
how poor those of afterwards distinguished 
writers may be, it did not annoy him that one 
who could talk so well should have written such 
rubbish. 

Lady Lufa had indeed a craze for composition, 
and the indulgence of it was encouraged by her 
facility. There was no reason in heaven, earth, 
or the other place, why what she wrote should 
see the light, for it had little to do with light 
of any sort. “Autumn Leaves” had had no 
such reception as her mother would have 
Walter believe. Lady Tremaine was one of 
those good mothers who, like “good church- 
men,” will wrong any other to get for their 
own. She had paid her court to Walter that 
she might gain a reviewer who would yield her 
daughter what she called justice : for justice- 
4 


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HOME AGAIN. 


sake she would curry favour! A half merry, 
half retaliative humour in Lufa, may have 
wrought for revenge by making Walter fall in 
love with her ; at all events it was a consolation 
to her wounded vanity when she saw him in 
love with her ; but it was chiefly in the hope 
of a “ good ” review of her next book that she 
cultivated his acquaintance, and now she felt 
sure of her end. 

Most people liked Walter, even when they 
laughed at his simplicity, for it was the sim- 
plicity of a generous nature ; we cannot there- 
fore wonder if he was too confident, and from 
lady Lufa’s behaviour presumed to think she 
looked upon him as worthy of a growing privi- 
lege. If she regarded literature as she professed 
to regard it, he had but to distinguish himself, 
he thought, to be more acceptable than wealth 
or nobility could have made him. As to 
material possibilities, the youth never thought 
of them ; a worshipper does not meditate how 
to feed his goddess ! Lady Lufa was his 


LOVE. 93 

universe and everything in it — a small universe 
and scantily furnished for a human soul, 
had she been the prime of women ! He 
scarcely thought of his home now, or of the 
father who made it home. As to God, it is 
hardly a question whether he had ever thought 
of him. For can that be called thinking of 
another, which is the mere passing of a name 
through the mind, without one following thought 
of relation or duty? Many think it a horrible 
thing to say there is no God, who never 
think how much worse a thing it is not to 
heed him. If God be not worth minding, 
what great ruin can it be to imagine his non- 
existence ? 

What, then, had Walter made of it by leaving 
home ? He had almost forgotten his father ; 
had learned to be at home in London ; had 
passed many judgments, some of them more 
or less just, all of them more or less unjust ; 
had printed enough for a volume of little better 
than truisms concerning life, society, fashion, 


94 HOME AGAIN. 

dress, etc., etc.; had published two or three rather 
nice songs, and had a volume of poems almost 
ready ; had kept himself the greater part of the 
time, and had fallen in love with an earl’s 
daughter. 

“ Everybody is gone,” said lady Lufa, “ and 
we are going to-morrow.” 

“To-day,” he rejoined, “London is full; to- 
morrow it will be a desert ! ” 

She looked up at him, and did not seem 
glad. 

“ I have enjoyed the season so much ! ” she 
said. 

He thought her lip trembled. 

“But you will come and see us at Comberidge, 
will you not ? ” she added. 

“ Do you think your mother will ask me ? ” 
he said. 

“ I think she will. I do so want to show you 
our library ! And I have so many things to ask 
you!” 

“ I am your slave, the jin of your lamp.” 


LOVE. 95 

“I would I had such a lamp as would call 
you!” 

u It will need no lamp to make me come.” 
Lamps to call moths are plenty, and Lufa 
was herself one. 


96 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XIII. 

" HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS?” 

LONDON was very hot, very dusty, and as 
dreary as Walter had anticipated. When Lufa 
went, the moon went out of the heavens, the 
stars chose banishment with their mistress, and 
only the bright, labour-urging sun was left. 

He might now take a holiday when he 
pleased, and he had money enough in hand. 
His father wanted him to pay them a visit ; but 
what if an invitation to Comberidge should 
arrive ! Home was a great way in the other 
direction ! And then it would be so dull ! He 
would of course be glad to see his father! He 
ought to go! He was owing there! What 
was he to do? He would not willingly even 


“HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS?” 9 7 

run the risk of losing his delight, for the sake of 
his first, best, truest earthly friend ! 

But he must take his holiday now, in the 
slack of the London year, and the heat was 
great ! He need not be all day with his father, 
and the thought of Lufa would be entrancing in 
the wide solitudes of the moor ! Molly he scarce 
thought of, and his aunt was to be forgotten. 
He would go for a few days, he said, thus 
keeping the door open for a speedy departure. 

Just before he left, the invitation did arrive. 
He would have a week to dream about it under 
the old roof! 

His heart warmed a little as he approached 
his home. Certain memories came to meet 
him. The thought of his mother was in the 
air. How long it was since she had spoken 
to him ! He remembered her and his father 
watching by his bed while he tossed in a misery 
of which he could even now recall the prevailing 
delirious fancies. He remembered his mother’s 
last rebuke — for insolence to a servant ; remem- 


98 HOME AGAIN. 

bered her last embrace, her last words ; and his 
heart turned tenderly to his father. Yet when 
he entered the house and faced the old surround- 
ings, an unexpected gloom overclouded him. 
Had he been heart-free and humble, they would 
have been full of delight for him ; but pride had 
been busy in his soul. Its home was in higher 
planes! How many essential refinements, as 
he foolishly and vulgarly counted them, were 
lacking here ! What would lady Lufa think of 
his entourage? Did it well become one of the 
second aristocracy ? He had been gradually 
filling with a sense of importance — which had 
no being except in his own brain ; and the 
notion took the meanest of mean forms — that 
of looking down on his own history. He was 
too much of a gentleman still not to repress the 
show of the feeling, but its mere presence caused 
a sense of alienation between him and his. 
When the first greetings were over, nothing 
came readily to follow. The wave had broken 
on the shore, and there was not another behind 


“ HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS ?” 99 

it. Things did not, however, go badly ; for the 
father when disappointed always tried to account 
for everything to the advantage of the other ; 
and on his part, Walter did his best to respond 
to his father’s love-courtesy. He was not of 
such as keep no rule over themselves ; not 
willingly would he allow discomfort to wake 
temper ; he did not brood over defect in those 
he loved ; but it did comfort him that he was 
so soon to leave his uncongenial surroundings, 
and go where all would be as a gentleman 
desired to see it. No one needs find it hard to 
believe such snobbishness in a youth gifted like 
Walter Colman ; for a sweet temper, fine sym- 
pathies, warmth of affection, cannot be called 
a man’s own, so long as he has felt and acted 
without co-operation of the will; and Walter 
had never yet fought a battle within himself. 
He had never set his will against his inclination. 
He had, indeed, bravely fronted the necessity 
of the world, but we cannot regard it as assur- 
ance of a noble nature that one is ready to 


100 


HOME AGAIN. 


labour for the things that are needful. A man 
is indeed contemptible who is not ready to 
work ; but not to be contemptible is hardly to 
be honourable. Walter had never actively 
chosen the right way, or put out any energy to 
walk in it. There are usurers and sinrifers nearer 
the kingdom of heaven than many a respectable, 
socially successful youth of education and 
ambition. Walter was not simple. He judged 
things not in themselves, but after an artificial 
and altogether foolish standard, for his aim was 
a false one — social distinction. 

The ways of his father’s house were nowise 
sordid, though so simple that his losses had 
made scarcely a difference in them ; they were 
hardly even humble — only old-fashioned ; but 
Walter was ashamed of them. He even thought 
it unladylike of Molly to rise from the table to 
wait on her uncle or himself ; and once, when 
she brought the tea-kettle in her own little 
brown hand, he actually reproved her. 

The notion that success lies in reaching the 


HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS?” IOI 


modes of life in the next higher social stratum ; 
the fancy that those ways are the standard of 
what is worthy, becoming, or proper; the idea 
that our standing is determined by our knowledge 
of what is or is not the things is one of the 
degrading influences of modern times. It is only 
the lack of dignity at once and courtesy that 
makes such points of any interest or consequence. 

Fortunately for Walter’s temper, his aunt was 
discreetly silent, too busy taking the youth’s 
measure afresh to talk much ; intent on material 
wherewith to make up her mind concerning him. 
She had had to alter her idea of him as incapable 
of providing his own bread and cheese ; but as to 
what reflection of him was henceforth to inhabit 
the glass of her judgment, she had not yet 
determined, farther than that it should be an 
unfavourable one. 

It was a relief when bedtime came, and he was 
alone in what was always called his room, where 
he soon fell asleep, to dream of Lufa and the 
luxuries around her — facilities accumulated even 


102 


HOME AGAIN. 


to encumbrance, and grown antagonistic to com- 
fort, as Helots to liberty. How different from 
his dreams were the things that stood around 
them ! how different his thoughts from those of 
the father who kneeled in the moonlight at the 
side of his bed, and said something to him who 
never sleeps ! When he woke, his first feeling 
was a pang : the things about him were as walls 
between him and Lufa ! 

From indifference, or preoccupation — from 
some cause — he avoided any tete-d,-tete with 
Molly. He had no true idea of the girl, neither 
indeed was capable of one. She was a whole 
nature ; he was of many parts, not yet begun to 
cohere. This unlikeness, probably, was at the 
root of his avoidance of her. Perhaps he had an 
undefined sense of rebuke, and feared her with- 
out being aware of it. Never going farther than 
half-way into a thing, he had never relished 
Molly’s questions ; they went deeper than he 
saw difficulty ; he was not even conscious of the 
darkness upon which Molly desired light cast. 


“HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS?” 103 

And now when, either from instinct, or sense 
of presence, he became aware that Molly was 
looking at him, he did not like it ; he felt as if 
she saw some lack of harmony between his con- 
sciousness and his history. He was annoyed, 
even irritated, with the olive-cheeked, black-eyed 
girl, who had been for so many years like his 
sister: she was making remarks upon him in 
that questioning laboratory of her brain ! 

Molly was indeed trying to understand what 
had gone different between them. She had never 
felt Walter come very near her, for he was not 
one who had learned, or would easily learn, to 
give himself ; and no man who does not give at 
least something of himself, gives anything ; but 
now she knew that he had gone further away, 
and she saw his father look disappointed. To 
Molly it was a sad relief when his departure 
came. They had not once disputed ; she had 
not once offered him a penny for his thoughts, 
or asked him a single question, yet he did not 
even want her to go to the station with him. 


i04 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

A MIDNIGHT REVIEW. 

From Comberidge a dogcart had been sent 
to meet him at the railway. He drove up the 
avenue as the sun was setting behind the house, 
and its long, low, terraced front received him into 
a cold shadow. The servant who opened the 
door said her ladyship was on the lawn ; and 
following him across the hall, Walter came out 
into the glory of a red sunset. Like a lovely 
carpet, or rather, like a green, silent river, the 
lawn appeared to flow from the house as from 
its fountain, issuing by the open doors and 
windows, and descending like a gentle rapid, to 
lose itself far away among trees and shrubs. Over 
it were scattered groups and couples and indi- 


A MIDNIGHT REVIEW. 


I°5 


viduals, looking like the creatures of a half angelic 
paradise. A little way off, under the boughs of 
a huge beech tree, sat Lufa, reading, with a pencil 
in her hand as if she made notes. As he stepped 
from the house, she looked up and saw him. She 
laid her book on the grass, rose, and came toward 
him. He went to meet her, but the light of the 
low sun was directly in his eyes, and^he could 
not see her shadowed face. But her voice of 
welcome came athwart the luminous darkness, 
and their hands found each other. He thought 
hers trembled, but it was his own. She led him 
to her mother. 

“ I am glad to see you,” said lady Tremaine. 
“ You are just in time ! ” 

“ For what, may I ask ? ” returned Walter. 

“ It is out at last ! ” 

“No, mamma,” interrupted Lufa; “the book 
is not out ! It is almost ready, but I have only 
had one or two early copies. I am so glad 
Mr. Colman will be the first to see it ! He will 
prepare me for the operation ! ” 


1 06 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ What do you mean ? ” asked Walter, bewil- 
dered. It was the first word he had heard of 
her new book. 

“Of course I shall be cut up! The weekly 
papers especially would lose half their readers 
did they not go in for vivisection ! But mamma 
shouldn’t have asked you now ! ” 

“Why?” 

“Well — you mightn’t — I shouldn’t like you to 
feel an atom less comfortable in speaking your 
mind.” 

“ There is no fear of that sort in my thoughts,” 
answered Walter, laughing. 

But it troubled him a little that she had not 
let him know what she was doing. 

“ Besides,” he went on, “ you need never know 
what I think. There are other reviewers on the 
Battery ! ” 

“ I should recognize your hand anywhere ! 
And more than that, I should only have to pick 
out the most rigid and unbending criticism to 
know which must be yours. It is your way, and 


A MIDNIGHT REVIEW. 


107 


you know it ! Are you not always showing me 
up to myself! That’s why I was in such mortal 
terror of your finding out what I was doing. 
If you had said anything to make me hate 
my work,” she went on, looking up at him with 
earnest eyes, “ I should never have touched it 
again ; and I did want to finish it ! You have 
been my master now for— let me see — how 
many months ? I do not know how I shall ever 
thank you!” Here she changed tone. “If I 
come off with a pound of flesh left, it will be 
owing entirely to the pains you have taken with 
me ! I wonder whether you will like any of my 
triolets ! But it is time to dress for dinner, so I 
will leave you in peace — but not all night, for 
when you go to bed you shall take yoiir copy 
with you to help you asleep.” 

While dressing he was full of the dread of 
not liking the book well enough to praise it as 
he wished. A first book was nothing, he said to 
himself ; it might be what it would ; but the 
second — that was another matter ! He recalled 


io8 


HOME AGAIN. 


what first books he knew. “Poems by Two 
Brothers ” gave not a foretaste of what was to 
come so soon after them ! Shelley’s prose 
attempts in his boyhood were below criticism ! 
Byron’s “ Hours of Idleness” were as idle as he 
called them! He knew what followed these 
and others, but what had followed lady Lufa’s ? 
That he was now to discover ! What if it 
should be no better than what preceded ! For 
his own part he did not, he would not much 
care. It was not for her poetry, it was for 
herself he loved her ! What she wrote was not 
she, and could make no difference ! It was not 
as if she had no genuine understanding of 
poetry, no admiration or feeling for it ! A poet 
could do well enough with a wife who never 
wrote a verse, but hardly with one who had no 
natural relation to it, no perception what it was ! 
A poet in love with one who laughed at his 
poetry ! — that would want scanning ! What or 
wherein could be their relation to each other ? 

He is a poor poet — and Walter was such a 


A MIDNIGHT REVIEW. 


109 


poet — who does not know there are better 
things than poetry. Keats began to discover 
it just ere he died. 

Walter feared therefore the coming gift, as 
he might that of a doubted enchantress. It was 
not the less a delight, however, to remember 
that she said, “ your copy.” But he must leave 
thinking and put on his neck-tie ! There are 
other things than time and tide that wait for 
no man ! 

Lady Tremaine gave him Lufa, and she took 
his arm with old familiarity. The talk at table 
w T as but such as it could hardly help being — 
only for Walter it was talk with Lufa ! The 
pleasure of talk often owes not much to the 
sense of it. There is more than the intellect 
concerned in talk ; there is more at its root than 
fact or logic or lying. 

When the scene changed to the drawing-room, 
Lufa played tolerably and sang well, delighting 
Walter. She asked and received his permission 
to sing “ my song,” as she called it, and pleased 


IIO 


HOME AGAIN. 


him with it more than ever. He managed to 
get her into the conservatory, which was large, 
and there he talked much, and she seemed to 
listen much. It was but the vague, twilit, 
allusive talk which, coming readily to all men 
in love, came the more readily to one always 
a poet, and not merely a poet by being in love. 
Every one in love sees a little farther into things, 
but few see clearly, and hence love-talk has in 
general so little meaning. Ordinary men in 
love gain glimpses of truth more and other 
than they usually see, but from having so little 
dealing with the truth, they do not even try 
to get a hold of it, they do not know it for 
truth even when dallying with it. It is the true 
man’s dreams that come true. 

He raised her hand to his lips as at length 
she turned toward the drawing-room, and he 
thought she more than yielded it, but could not 
be sure. Anyhow she was not offended, for she 
smiled with her usual sweetness as she bade him 
good night. 


A MIDNIGHT REVIEW. 


Ill 


“ One instant, Mr. Colman ! ” she added : “ I 
promised you a sedative ! I will run and get 
it — No, I won’t keep you ; I will send it to your 
room.” 

He had scarce shut his door when it opened 
again, and there was Lufa. 

“ I beg your pardon ! ” she said ; “ I thought 
you would not be come up, and I wanted to 
make my little offering with my own hand : 
it owes so much to you ! ” 

She slipped past him, laid her book on his 
table, and went. 

He lighted his candles with eager anxiety, 
and took it up. It was a dramatic poem of some 
length, daintily bound in white vellum, with gilt 
edges. On the title-page was written “The 
Master’s copy,” with the date and Lufa’s initials. 
He threw himself into a great soft chair that 
with open arms invited him, and began to read. 

He had taken champagne pretty freely at 
dinner ; his mind was yet in the commotion left 
by the summer- wind of their many words that 


1 12 


HOME AGAIN. 


might mean so much ; he felt his kiss of her 
dainty hand, and her pressure of it to his lips ; 
as he read, she seemed still and always in the 
doorway, entering with the book ; its inscription 
was continually turning up with a shine : such 
was the mood in which he read the poem. 
Through he read it, every word, some of it many 
times ; then rose and went to his writing-table, 
to set down his judgment of his lady’s poem. 
He wrote and wrote, almost without pause. 
The dawn began to glimmer, the red blood of 
the morning came back to chase the swoon of 
the night, ere at last, throwing down his pen, he 
gave a sigh of weary joy, tore off his clothes, 
plunged into his bed, and there lay afloat on the 
soft waves of sleep. And as he slept, the sun 
came slowly up to shake the falsehood out 
of the earth. 


C “3 ) 


CHAPTER XV. 

REFLECTION. 

WALTER slept until nearly noon, then rose, very 
weary, but with a gladness at his heart. On 
his table were spread such pages as must please 
Lufa ! His thoughts went back to the poem, 
but, to his uneasy surprise, he found he did not 
recall it with any special pleasure. He had had 
great delight in reading it, and in giving shape 
to his delight, but he could not now think what 
kind of thing it was that had given him such 
satisfaction. He had worked too long, he said 
to himself, and this was the reaction ; he was 
too tired to enjoy the memory of what he had 
so heartily admired. ^Esthetic judgment was 
so dependent on mood ! He would glance over 
what he had done, correct it a little, and inclose 


HOME AGAIN. 


1 14 

it for the afternoon-post, that it might appear 
.in the next issue ! 

He drank the cup of cold tea by his bedside, 
sat down, and took up his hurriedly written 
sheets. He found in them much that seemed 
good work— of his own ; and the passages 
quoted gave ostensible ground for the remarks 
made upon them ; but somehow the whole 
affair seemed quite different. The review would 
incline any lover of verse to read the book ; 
and the passages cited were preceded and 
followed by rich and praiseful epithets; but 
neither quotations nor remarks moved in him 
any echo of response. He gave the manuscript 
what correction it required, which was not much, 
for Walter was an accurate as well as ready 
writer, laid it aside, and took up the poem. 

What could be the matter ? There was 
nothing but embers where had been glow and 
flame ! Something must be amiss with him ! 
He recalled an occasion on which, feeling 
similarly with regard to certain poems till then 


REFLECTION. 


115 

favourites, he was sorely troubled, but a serious 
attack of illness very soon relieved his perplexity : 
something like it must surely be at hand to 
account for the contradiction between Walter 
last night and Walter this morning! Closer 
and closer he scanned what he read, peering 
if he might to its very roots, in agonized en- 
deavour to see what he had seen as he wrote. 
But his critical consciousness neither acknow- 
ledged what he had felt, nor would grant him 
in a condition of poetic collapse. He read on 
and on ; read the poem through ; turned back, 
and read passage after passage again ; but with- 
out one individual approach to the revival of 
former impression. “ Commonplace ! common- 
place ! ” echoed in his inner ear, as if whispered 
by some mocking spirit. He argued that he had 
often found himself too fastidious. His demand 
for finish ruined many of his verses, rubbing and 
melting and wearing them away, like frost and 
wind and rain, till they were worthless! The 
predominance and over-keenness of the critical 


1 1 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


had turned in him to disease ! His eye was 
sharpened to see the point of a needle, but a 
tree only as a blotted mass ! A man’s mind was 
meant to receive as a mirror, not to concentrate 
rays like a convex lens ! Was it not then likely 
that the first reading gave the true impression 
of the ethereal, the vital, the flowing, the 
iridescent ? Did not the solitary and silent 
night brood like a hen on the nest of the poet’s 
imaginings ? Was it not the night that waked 
the soul ? Did not the commonplace vanish 
along with the “ garish ” day ? How then could 
its light afford the mood fit for judging a poem 
— the cold sick morning, when life is but half 
worth living! Walter did not think how much 
champagne he had taken, nor how much that 
might have to do with one judgment at night 
and another in the morning. “Set one mood 
against another,” he said, conscious all the time 
it was a piece of special pleading, “and the one 
weighs as much as the other!” For it was 
horrible to him to think that the morning was 


REFLECTION. 


117 


the clear-eyed, and that the praise he had 
lavished on the book was but a vapour of the 
night How was he to carry himself to the lady 
of his love, who at most did not care half as 
much for him as for her book ? 

How poetry could be such a passion with her 
when her own was but mediocre, was a question 
Walter dared not shape — not, however, that he 
saw the same question might be put with regard 
to himself : his own poetry was neither strong 
nor fresh nor revealing. He had not noted that 
an unpoetic person will occasionally go into a 
mild ecstasy over phrase or passage or verse in 
which a poet may see little or nothing. 

He came back to this : — his one hour had as 
good a claim to insight as his other ; if he saw 
the thing so once, why not say what he had 
seen? Why should not the thing stand? His 
consciousness of the night before had certainly 
been nearer that of a complete, capable being, 
than that of to-day! He was in a higher 
human condition then than now! 


1 1 8 


HOME AGAIN. 


But here came another doubt : what was he 
to conclude concerning his other numerous 
judgments passed irrevocably? Was he called 
and appointed to influence the world’s opinion 
of the labour of hundreds according to the 
mood he happened to be in, or the hour at 
which he read their volumes ? But if he must 
write another judgment of that poem in vellum 
and gold, he must first pack his portmanteau ! 
To write in her home as he felt now, would be 
treachery ! 

Not confessing it, he was persuading himself 
to send on the review. Of course, had he the 
writing of it now, he would not write a paper 
like that ! But the thing being written, it could 
claim as good a chance of being right as 
another ! Had it not been written as honestly 
as another of to-day would be? Might it not 
be just as true ? The laws of art are so 
undefined ! 

Thus on and on went the windmill of heart 
and brain, until at last the devil, or the devil’s 


REFLECTION. 


119 

shadow — that is, the bad part of the man him- 
self — got the better, and Walter, not being true, 
did a lie — published the thing he would no 
longer have said. He thought he worshipped 
the truth, but he did not. He knew that the 
truth was everything, but a lie came that seemed 
better than the truth. In his soul he knew he 
was not acting truly ; that had he honestly 
loved the truth, he would not have played hocus 
pocus with metaphysics and logic, but would 
have made haste to a manly conclusion. He 
took the packet, and on his way to the dining- 
room, dropped it into the post-box in the hall. 

During lunch he was rather silent and 
abstracted : the packet was not gone, and his 
conscience might yet command him to recall it ! 
When the hour was past, and the paper beyond 
recovery, he felt easier, saying to himself, what 
was done could not be undone ; he would be 
more careful another time. One comfort was, 
that at least he had done no injustice to Lufa ! 
He did not reflect that he had done her the 


120 


HOME AGAIN. 


greatest injustice in helping her to believe that 
worthy which was not worthy, herself worshipful 
who was not worshipful. He told her that he 
finished her drama before going to bed, and 
was perfectly charmed with it. That it as much 
exceeded his expectations then as it had fallen 
below them since, he did not say. 

In the evening was he not so bright as before. 
Lufa saw it and was troubled. She feared he 
doubted the success of her poem. She led the 
way, and found he avoided talking about it. 
She feared he was not so well pleased with it 
as he had said. Walter asked if he might not 
read from it in the drawing-room. She would 
not consent. 

“None there are of our sort!” she said. 
“They think literature foolishness. Even my 
mother, the best of mothers, doesn’t care about 
poetry, cannot tell one measure from another. 
Come and read a page or two of it in the 
summer house in the wilderness instead. I 
want to know how it will sound in people’s ears.” 


REFLECTION. 


121 


Walter was ready enough. He was fond of 
reading aloud, and believed he could so read 
the poem that he need not say anything. And 
certainly, if justice meant making the words 
express more than was in them, he did it justice. 
But in truth the situation was sometimes touch- 
ing ; and the more so to Walter that the hero 
was the lady’s inferior in birth, means, and 
position — much more her inferior than Walter 
was Lufa’s. The lady alone was on the side 
of the lowly born ; father, mother, brothers, 
sisters, uncles, aunts, and cousins to the remotest 
degree, against him even to hatred. The general 
pathos of the idea disabled the criticism of 
the audience, composed of the authoress and 
the reader, blinding perhaps both to not a little 
that was neither brilliant nor poetic. The lady- 
wept at the sound of her own verses from the 
lips of one who was to her in the position of 
the hero toward the heroine ; and the lover, 
critic as he was, could not but be touched when 
he saw her weep at passages suggesting his 


122 


HOME AGAIN. 


relation to her ; so that, when they found the 
hand of the one resting in that of the other, it 
did not seem strange to either. When suddenly 
the lady snatched hers away, it was only because 
a mischievous little bird spying them, and 
hurrying away to tell, made a great fluttering 
in the foliage. Then was Walter’s conscience 
not a little consoled, for he was aware of a 
hearty love for the poem. Under such condi- 
tions he could have gone on reading it all the 
night ! 


( 123 ) 


CHAPTER XVI. 

THE RIDE TOGETHER. 

Days passed, and things went on much the 
same, Walter not daring to tell the girl all he 
felt, but seizing every opportunity of a tete-a- 
tete , and missing none of the proximity she 
allowed him, and she never seeming other than 
pleased to be his companion. Her ways with 
him were always pretty, and sometimes playful. 
She was almost studious to please him ; and 
if she never took a liberty with him, she never 
resented any he took with her, which certainly 
were neither numerous nor daring, for Walter 
was not presumptuous, least of all with women. 

But Lufa was careful not to neglect their 
other guests. She was always ready to ac- 
5 


124 


HOME AGAIN. 


company any of the ladies riding out of a 
morning; and a Mr. Sefton, who was there 
when Walter arrived, generally rode with them. 
He was older than Walter, and had taken little 
notice of him, which Walter resented more than 
he would have cared to acknowledge. He was 
tall and lanky, with a look of not having been 
in the oven quite long enough, but handsome 
nevertheless. Without an atom of contempt, 
he cared nothing for what people might think ; 
and when accused of anything, laughed, and 
never defended himself. Having no doubt he 
was in the right, he had no anxiety as to the 
impression he might make. In the hunting 
field he was now reckless, now so cautious that 
the men would chaff him. But they knew well 
enough that whatever he did came either of 
pure whim or downright good sense ; no one 
ever questioned his pluck. I believe an inter- 
mittent laziness had something to do with his 
inconsistency. 

It had been taken for granted by Lufa that 


THE RIDE TOGETHER. 1 25 

Walter could not ride ; whereas, not only had 
he had some experience, but he was one of the 
few possessed of an individual influence over 
the lower brotherhood of animals, and his was 
especially equine. 

One morning, from an ailment in one of the 
horses, Lufa found that her mount required 
consideration. Sefton said the horse he had 
been riding would carry her perfectly. 

“ What will you do for a horse ? ” 

“ Go without.” 

“ What shall we do for a gentleman ? ” 

“ Go without.” 

“ I saw a groom this morning,” suggested 
Walter, “on a lovely little roan!” 

“Ah, Red Racket!” answered lady Lufa. 
“ He is no horse ; he is a little fiend. Goes as 
gently as a lamb with my father, though, or 
any one that he knows can ride him. Try Red 
Racket, George.” 

They were cousins, though not in the next 
degree. 


126 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ I would if I could sit him. But I’m not a 
rough rider, and much disinclined to have my 
bones broken. It’s not as if there was anything 
to be got by it, even a brush ! ” 

“Two hours of your sister, your cousin, and 
their friend ! ” said Lufa. 

“ Much of you I should have with Red Racket 
under me — or over me as likely ! at best jump- 
ing about, and taking all the attention I had ! 
No, thank you ! ” 

“ Come, George,” said his sister, “ you will 
make them think you are no horseman ! ” 

“ Neither I am ; I have not a good seat, and 
you know it ! I am not going to make a fool 
of myself on compulsion ! I know what I can 
do, and what I can’t do.” 

“I wish I had the chance !” murmured Walter, 
as if to himself, but so that Lufa heard. 

“You can ride?” said Lufa, with pleased 
surprise. 

“ Why not ? ” returned Walter. “ Every 
Englishman should ride.” 


THE RIDE TOGETHER. 


127 


“Yes; every Englishman should swim; but 
Englishmen are drowned every day ! ” 

“ That is as often because they can swim, but 
have not Mr. Sefton’s prudence.” 

“You mustn’t think my cousin afraid of Red 
Racket ! ” she returned. 

“ I don’t. He doesn’t look like it ! ” 

“ Do you really wish to ride the roan ? ” 

“ Indeed I do ! ” 

“ I will order him round,” she said, rising. 

Walter did not quite enjoy her consenting so 
easily : had she no fear for him of the risk Mr. 
Sefton would not run ? 

“ She wants me to cut a good figure ! ” he said 
to himself, and went to get ready. 

I have no deed of prowess on Walter’s part 
to record. The instant he was in the saddle, 
Red Racket recognized a master. 

“You can’t have ridden him before?” quest- 
ioned Lufa. 

v I never saw him till this morning.” 

“ He likes you, I suppose ! ” she said. 


28 


HOME AGAIN. 


As they returned, the other ladies being in 
front, and the groom some distance behind, 
Walter brought his roan side by side with Lufa’s 
horse, and said — 

“You know Browning’s ‘Last Ride To- 
gether’?” 

“Yes,” she answered, with a faint blush ; “but 
this is not our last ride ! It is our first ! Why 
didn’t you tell me? We might have had many 
rides together ! ” 

“ Promise me a last one,” he said. 

“ How can I ? How should I know it was 
the last?” 

“ Promise,” he persisted, “ that if ever you see 
just one last ride possible, you will let me 
know.” 

She hesitated a moment, then answered — 

“I will” 

“Thank you !” said Walter with fervour. 

As by consent, they rode after the others. 

Walter had not yet the courage to say any- 
thing definite. But he had said many things 


THE RIDE TOGETHER. 


129 


that must have compelled her to imagine what 
he had not said ; therefore the promise she had 
given him seemed encouraging. They rode in 
silence the rest of the way. 

When Sefton saw Red Racket as quiet as a. 
lamb, he went up to him, stroked his neck, and 
said to Walter : 

“With me he would have capered like an 
idiot till he had thrown me. It is always my 
luck with horses of his colour ! You must have 
a light hand ! ” 

He stroked his neck once more, turned aside, 
and was too late to help the ladies dismount. 

It was the last ride for the present, because of 
a change in the weather. In a few days came 
The Field Battery with Walter’s review, bringing 
a revival of the self-reproach he had begun to 
forget. The paper felt in his hand like bad 
news or something nasty. He could not bear 
the thought of having to take his part in the talk 
it would occasion. It could not now be helped, 
however, and that was a great comfort ! It was 


130 


HOME AGAIN. 


impossible, none the less, to keep it up ! As he 
had foreseen, all this time came no revival of his 
first impression of the poem. He went to find 
his hostess, and told her he must go to London 
that same afternoon. As he took his leave, he 
put the paper in Lufa’s hand, saying, 

“You will find there what I have said about 
the poem.” 


( *3* ) 


CHAPTER XVII. 

HIS BOOK. 

I NEED hardly say he found his first lonely 
evening dull. He was not yet capable of looking 
beneath the look of anything. He felt cabined, 
cribbed, confined. His world-clothing came too 
near him. From the flowing robes of a park, 
a great house, large rooms, wide staircases — 
with plenty of air and space, colour, softness, 
fitness, completeness, he found himself in the 
worn, tight, shabby garment of a cheap London 
lodging! But Walter, far from being a wise 
man, was not therefore a fool ; he was not one 
whom this world cannot teach, and who has 
therefore to be sent to some idiot-asylum in the 
next, before sense can be got into him, or, 
rather, out of him. No man is a fool, who, 


132 


HOME AGAIN. 


having work to do, sets himself to do it, and 
Walter did. He had begun a poem to lead the 
van of a volume, of which the rest was nearly 
ready : into it he now set himself to weave a 
sequel to her drama, from the point where she 
had left the story. Every hour he could spare 
from drudgery he devoted to it — urged by the 
delightful prospect of letting Lufa see what he 
could do. Gaining facility with his stanza as 
he went on, the pleasure of it grew, and more 
than comforted his loneliness. Sullivan could 
hardly get him from his room. 

Finding a young publisher prepared to under- 
take half the risk, on the ground, unexpressed, 
of the author’s proximity to the judgment-seat, 
Walter, too experienced to look for any gain, 
yet hoped to clear his expenses, and became 
liable for much more than he possessed. 

He had one little note from Lufa, concerning 
a point in rhythm which perplexed her. She 
had a good ear, and was conscientious in her 
mechanics. There was not a cockney-rime 


HIS BOOK. 


I 33 


from beginning to end of her poem, which is 
more than the uninitiated will give its weight 
to. But she understood nothing of the broken 
music which a master of verse will turn to 
such high service. There are lines in Milton 
which Walter, who knew far more than she, 
could not read until long after, when Dante 
taught him how. 

In the month of December came another 
note from lady Lufa, inviting him to spend a 
week with them after Christmas. 

“ Perhaps then we may have yet a ride to- 
gether,” added a postscript. 

“ What does she mean ? ” thought Walter, 
a pale fear at his heart. “She cannot mean 
our last ride ! ” 

One conclusion he came to — that he must 
tell her plainly he loved her. The thing was 
only right, though of course ridiculous in the 
eyes of worldly people, said the far from un- 
worldly poet. True, she was the daughter of 
an earl, and he the son of a farmer ; and 


134 HOME AGAIN. 

those who called the land their own looked 
down upon those who tilled it ! But a banker, 
or a brewer, or the son of a contractor who had 
wielded the spade, might marry an earl’s 
daughter : why should not the son of a farmer 
— not to say one who, according to the lady’s 
mother, himself belonged to an aristocracy ? 
The farmer’s son indeed was poor, and who 
would look at a poor banker, or a poor brewer, 
more than a poor farmer ! it was all money ! 
But was he going to give in to that ? Was he 
to grant that possession made a man honourable, 
and the want of it despicable ! To act as if she 
could think after such a silly fashion, would be 
to insult her ! He would lay bare his heart to 
her! There were things in it which she knew 
what value to set upon — things as far before 
birth as birth was before money ! He would 
accept the invitation, and if possible get his 
volume out before the day mentioned, so as, he 
hoped, to be a little in the mouth of the public 
when he went ! 


HIS BOOK. 135 

Walter, like many another youth, imagined 
the way to make a woman love him, was to 
humble himself before her, tell her how beautiful 
she was, and how much he loved her. I do not 
see why any woman should therefore love a 
man. If she loves him already, anything will 
do to make her love him more ; if she does 
not, no entreaty will wake what is not there 
to be waked. Even wrong and cruelty and care- 
lessness may increase love already rooted ; but 
neither love, nor kindness, nor worship, will 
prevail to plant it. 

In his formal acceptance of the invitation, he 
inclosed some verses destined for his volume, in 
which he poured out his boyish passion over his 
lady’s hair, and eyes, and hands — a poem not 
without some of the merits made much of by 
the rising school of the day, and possessing 
qualities higher, perhaps, than those upon which 
that school chiefly prided itself. She made, 
and he expected, no acknowledgment, but she 
did not return the verses. 


136 


HOME AGAIN. 


Lyric after lyric, with Lufa for its inspiration, 
he wrought, like damask flowers, into his poem. 
Every evening, and all the evening, sometimes 
late into the morning, he fashioned and filed, 
until at length it was finished. 

When the toiling girl who waited on him 
appeared with the proof-sheets in her hand, 
she came like a winged ministrant laying a 
wondrous gift before him. And in truth, poor 
as he came to think it, was it not a gift greater 
than any angel could have brought him ? Was 
not the seed of it sown in his being by him that 
loved him before he was ? These were the poor 
first flowers, come to make way for better — 
themselves a gift none but God could give. 

The book was rapidly approaching its birth, 
as the day of Lufa’s summons drew near. He 
had inscribed the volume to her, not by name, 
but in a dedication she could not but understand 
and no other would, founded on her promise of 
a last ride : it was so delightful to have a secret 
with her ! He hoped to the last to take a copy 


HIS BOOK. 137 

with him, but was disappointed by some con- 
tretemps connected with the binding — about 
which he was as particular as if it had been 
itself a poem: he had to pack his portmanteau 
without it. 

Continuously almost, on his way to the 
station, he kept repeating to himself : “ Is it to 
be the last ride, or only another ? 99 


138 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

A WINTER AFTERNOON. 

WHEN Walter arrived, he found the paradise 
under snow. But the summer had only run 
in-doors, and there was blooming. Lufa was 
kinder than ever, but, he fancied, a little em- 
barrassed, which he interpreted to his advantage. 
He was shown to the room he had before 
occupied. 

It did not take him long to learn the winter 
ways of the house. Mr. and Miss Sefton were 
there ; and all seemed glad of his help against 
consciousness ; for there could be no riding so 
long as the frost lasted and the snow kept 
falling, and the ladies did not care to go out ; 
and in some country-houses Time has as many 
lives as a cat, and wants a great deal of killing — - 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


139 


a butchery to be one day bitterly repented, 
perhaps ; but as a savage cannot be a citizen, 
so cannot people of fashion belong to the king- 
dom of heaven. 

The third morning came a thaw, with a storm 
of wind and rain ; and after lunch they gathered 
in the glooming library, and began to tell ghost 
stories. Walter happened to know a few of the 
rarer sort, and found himself in his element. 
His art came to help him, and the eyes of the 
ladies, and he rose to his best. As he was 
working one of his tales to its climax, Mr. 
Sefton entered the room, where Walter had 
been the only gentleman, and took a chair 
beside Lufa. She rose, saying, 

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Colman, but would 
you mind stopping a minute while I get a little 
more red silk for my imperial dragon? Mr. 
Sefton has already taken the sting out of the 
snake ! ” 

“ What snake ? ” asked Sefton. 

“The snake of terror,” she answered. “Did 


140 


HOME AGAIN. 


you not see him as you came in — erect on 
his coiled tail, drawing his head back for his 
darting spring ? ” 

“ I am very sorry,” said Sefton. “ I have 
injured everybody, and I hope everybody will 
pardon me ! ” 

When Lufa had found her silk, she took a 
seat nearer to Walter, who resumed and finished 
his narrative. 

“ I wonder she lived to tell it ! ” said one of 
the ladies. 

“ For my part,” rejoined their hostess, “ I do 
not see why every one should be so terrified at 
the thought of meeting a ghost ! It seems to 
me cowardly.” 

“ I don’t think it cowardly,” said Sefton, “ to 
be frightened at a ghost, or at anything else.” 

“ Now don’t say you would run away ! ” 
remonstrated his sister. 

“ I couldn’t very well, don’t you know, if I 
was in bed ! But I might — I don’t know — 
hide my head under the blankets l ” 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 141 

u I don’t believe it a bit ! ” 

“ To be sure,” continued Sefton reflectively, 
“ there does seem a difference! To hide is one 
thing, and to run is another — quite another 
thing ! If you are frightened, you are frightened 
and you can’t help it ; but if you run away, then 
you are a coward. Yes ; quite true ! And yet 
there are things some men, whom other men 
would be afraid to call cowards, would run from 
fast enough ! — Your story, Mr. Colman,” he went 
on, u reminds me of an adventure I had — if that 
be an adventure where was no danger — except, 
indeed, of losing my wits, which Lufa would say 
was no great loss. I don’t often tell the story, 
for I have an odd weakness for being believed ; 
and nobody ever does believe that story, though 
it is as true as I live ; and when a thing is true, 
the blame lies with those that don’t believe it. 
Ain’t you of my mind, Mr. Colman?” 

“ You had better not appeal to him ! ” said 
Lufa. “ Mr. Colman does not believe a word of 
the stories he has been telling. He regards 


142 


HOME AGAIN. 


them entirely from the artistic point of view, and 
cares only for their effect. He is writing a 
novel t and wants to study people under a ghost- 
story.” 

“ I don’t endorse your judgment of me, lady 
Lufa,” said Walter, who did not quite like what 
she said. “ I am ready to believe anything 
in which I can see reason. I should like much 
to hear Mr. Sefton’s story. I never saw the 
man that saw a ghost, except Mr. Sefton be 
that man.” 

“ You shall say what you will when you have 
heard. I shall offer no explanation, only tell 
you what I saw, or, if you prefer it, experienced ; 
you must then fall back on your own meta- 
physics. I don’t care what anybody thinks 
about it.” 

“ You are not very polite ! ” said Lufa. 

“ Only truthful,” replied Sefton. 

“ Please go on ? ” 

“ We are dying to hear ! ” 

“ A real ghost story l ” 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


143 


“ Is it your best, George ? ” 

“ It is my only one,” Sefton answered, and 
was silent a few moments, as if arranging his 
thoughts. 

“ Well, here goes ! ” he began. “ I was 

staying at a country house ” 

“ Not here, I hope ! ” said Lufa. 

“ I have reasons for not saying where it was, 
or where it wasn’t. It may have been in Ireland, 
it may have been in Scotland, it may have been 
in England ; it was in one of the three — an old 
house, parts very old. One morning I happened 
to be late, and found the breakfast-table deserted. 
I was not the last, however ; for presently another 
man appeared, whom I had met at dinner the 
day before for the first time. We both happened 
to be in the army, and had drawn a little 
together. The moment I saw him, I knew he 
had passed an uncomfortable night. His face 
was like dough, with livid spots under the eyes. 
He sat down and poured himself out a cup of 
tea. * Game-pie ? ’ I said, but he did not heed 


144 


HOME AGAIN. 


me. There was nobody in the room but our- 
selves, and I thought it best to leave him alone. 
‘ Are you an old friend of the family ? ’ he said 
at length. * About the age of most friends,’ I 
answered. He was silent again for a bit, then 
said, ‘ I’m going to cut ! ’ * Ha, ha ! ’ thought I, 

and something more. ‘ No, it’s not that ! ’ he 
said, reading my thought, which had been about 
a lady in the house with us. ‘ Pray don’t imagine 
I want to know,’ I replied. ‘ Neither do I want 
to tell,’ he rejoined. ‘ I don’t care to have fellows 
laugh at me ! ’ ‘ That’s just what I don’t care to 

do. Nothing hurts me less than being laughed 
at, so I take no pleasure in it,’ I said. * What I 
do want,’ said he, ‘ is to have you tell Mrs. — ’ 
— There ! I was on the very edge of saying her 
name ! and you would have known who she was, 
all of you ! I am glad I caught myself in time ! 
— ‘ tell Mrs. Blank,’ said he, ‘ why I went.’ ‘Very 
well ! I will. Why are you going ? ’ ‘ Can’t you 
help a fellow to an excuse ? I’m not going to 
give her the reason.’ ‘Tell me what you want 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


145 


me to say, and I will tell her you told me to say 
so.’ ‘ I will tell you the truth.’ ‘ Fire away, 
then/ ‘ I was in a beastly funk last night. I 
dare say you think as I did, that a man ought 
never to be a hair off the cool?’ ‘That 
depends/ I replied; ‘there are some things, 
and there may be more, at which any but 
an idiot might well be scared ; but some fools 
are such fools they can’t shiver ! What’s the 
matter? I give you my word I’ll not make 
game of it/ The fellow looked so seedy, don’t 
you know, I couldn’t but be brotherly, or, at 
least, cousinly to him ! — that don’t go for much, 
does it, Lufa ? ‘ Well,’ he said, ‘ I will tell you. 

Last night, I had been in bed about five minutes, 
and hadn’t even had time to grow sleepy, when 
I heard a curious shuffling in the passage outside 
my door, and an indescribable terror came over 
me. To be perfectly open with you, however, I 
had heard that was the sign she was coming ! ’ 

‘ Who coming?’ said I. ‘The ghost, of course!’ 
he answered. ‘ The ghost ! ’ ‘You don’t mean 


146 


HOME AGAIN. 


to say you never heard of the ghost ? ’ * Never 

heard a word of it.’ ‘ Well, they don’t like to 
speak of it, but everybody knows it ! ’ ‘Go on/ 
said I ; and he did, but plainly v/ith a tearing 
effort. ‘ The shuffling was like feet in slippers 
much too big. As if I had been five instead of 
five and thirty, I dived under the blankets, and 
lay so for minutes after the shuffling had ceased. 
But at length I persuaded myself it was but a 
foolish fancy, and I had never really heard any- 
thing. What with fear and heat I was much in 
want of breath too, I can tell you ! So I came 
to the surface, and looked out.’ Here he paused 
a moment, and turned almost livid. ‘There 
stood a horrible old woman, staring at me, as if 
she had been seeing me all the time, and the 
blankets made no difference ! ’ ‘ Was she really 

ugly?’ I asked. ‘Well, I don’t know what you 
call ugly/ he answered, * but if you had seen her 
stare, you would have thought her ugly enough ! 
Had she been as beautiful as a houri, though, I 
don’t imagine I should have been less frightened ! ’ 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


147 


‘ Well/ said I, for he had come to a pause, ‘ and 
what came next ? ’ ‘I cannot tell. I came to 
myself all trembling, and as cold and as wet as 
if I had been dipped in a well.’ ‘You are sure 
you were not dreaming ? ’ I said. * I was not. 
But I do not expect you to believe me ! * ‘You 
must not be offended/ I said, ‘ if I find the thing 
stiff to stow ! I believe you all the same.’ 
'What?’ he said, not quite understanding me. 
‘An honest man and a gentleman/ I answered. 
‘ And a coward to boot ! ’ ‘ God forbid ! * I 

returned : ‘ what man can answer for himself at 
every moment ! If I remember, Hector turned 
at last and ran from Achilles!’ He said nothing, 
and I went on. ‘ I once heard a preaching fellow 
say, “ When a wise man is always wise, then is 
the kingdom of heaven ! ” and I thought he 
knew something ! ’ I talked, don’t you know, 
to quiet him. ‘ I once saw,’ I said, ‘ the best- 
tempered man I ever knew, in the worst rage I 
ever saw man in — though I must allow he had 
good reason !’ He drank his cup of tea, got up, 


148 


HOME AGAIN. 


and said, ‘ I’m off. Good-bye — and thank you ! 
A million of money wouldn’t make me stay in 
the house another hour ! There is that in it I 
fear ten times worse than the ghost ?’ ‘ Gracious ! 
what is that ? ’ I said. ‘ This horrible cowardice 
oozing from her like a mist. The house is full 
of it ! ’ * But what shall I say to Mrs. Blank ? ’ 

4 Anything you like.’ 4 1 will say then, that you 
are very sorry, but were compelled to go.’ ‘Say 
what you please, only let me go ! Tell them to 
send my traps after me. Good-bye ! I’m in a 
sepulchre ! I shall have to throw up my com- 
mission ! ’ So he went.” 

“ And what became of him ? ” 

“ I’ve neither seen nor heard of him to this 
day!” 

He ceased with the cadence of an ended story. 

“ Is that all ? ” 

“ You spoke of an adventure of your own ! ” 

“ I was flattering myself, ” said Lufa, “ that in 
our house Mr. Colman was at last to hear a ghost 
story from the man’s own lips 1 ” 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


149 


“The sun is coming out!” said Sefton. “I 
will have a cigar at the stables.” 

The company protested, but he turned a deaf 
ear to expostulation, and went. 


HOME AGAIN, 


150 


CHAPTER XIX. 

THE BODILESS. 

IN the drawing-room after dinner, some of the 
ladies gathered about him, and begged the story 
of his own adventure. He smiled queerly. 

“ Very well, you shall have it ! ” he answered. 

They seated themselves, and the company 
came from all parts of the room — among the 
rest, Lufa and Walter. 

“ It was three days, if I remember,” began 
Sefton, “ after my military friend left, when one 
night I found myself alone in the drawing-room, 
just waked from a brown study. No one had 
said good night to me. I looked at my watch ; 
it was half-past eleven. I rose and went. My 
bedroom was on the first floor. 


THE BODILESS. 


151 

“The stairs were peculiar — a construction later 
than much of the house, but by no means modern. 
When you reached the landing of the first floor 
and looked up, you could see above you the 
second floor, defended by a balustrade between 
arches. There were no carpets on stairs or 
landings, which were all of oak. 

“ I cannot certainly say what made me look 
up ; but I think, indeed I am almost sure, I 
had heard a noise like that the ghost was said 
to make, as of one walking in shoes too large : 
I saw a lady looking down over the balusters 
on the second floor. I thought some one was 
playing me a trick, and imitating the ghost, for 
the ladies had been chaffing me a good deal 
that night ; they often do. She wore an old- 
fashioned, browny, silky looking dress. I rushed 
up to see who was taking the rise out of me. I 
looked up at her as I ran, and she kept looking 
down, but apparently not at me. Her face was 
that of a middle-aged woman, beginning, indeed, 
to be old, and had an intent, rather troubled 


152 HOME AGAIN. 

look, I should say ; but I did not consider it 
closely. 

“ I was at the top in a moment, on the level 
where she stood leaning over the handrail. 
Turning, I approached her. Apparently, she 
neither saw nor heard me. ‘ Well acted ! ’ I said 
to myself — but even then I was beginning to 
be afraid, without knowing why. Every man’s 
impulse, I fancy, is to go right up to anything 
that frightens him — at least, I have always found 
it so. I walked close up to the woman. She 
moved her head and turned in my direction, but 
only as if about to go away. Whether she looked 
at me I cannot tell, but I saw her eyes plain 
enough. By this time, I suppose, the idea of a 
ghost must have been uppermost, for, being now 
quite close to her, I put out my hand as if to 
touch her. My hand went through her — through 
her head and body ! I am not joking in the 
least ; I mean you to believe, if you can, exactly 
what I say. What then she did, or whether she 
took any notice of my movement, I cannot tell ; 


THE BODILESS. 1 53 

I only know what I did, or rather what I did not 
do. For, had I been capable, I should have 
uttered a shriek that would have filled the house 
with ghastliest terror ; but there was a load of 
iron on my chest, and the hand of a giant at my 
throat. I could not help opening my mouth, for 
something drew all the muscles of my jaws and 
throat, but I could not utter a sound. The 
horror I was in, was entirely new to me, and 
no more under my control than a fever. I only 
wonder it did not paralyze me, that I was able 
to turn and run down the stair ! I ran as if all 
the cardinal sins were at my heels. I flew, never 
seeming to touch the stairs as I went. I darted 
along the passage, burst into my room, shut 
and locked the door, lighted my candles, fell 
into a chair, shuddered, and began to breathe 
again.” 

He ceased, not without present signs of the 
agitation he described. 

“ But that’s not all ! ” 

“ And what else ? ” 


154 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Did anything happen ? ” 

“ Do tell us more.” 

“ I have nothing more to tell,” answered 
Sefton. “ But I haven’t done wondering what 
could have put me in such an awful funk ! You 
can’t have a notion what it was like ! ” 

“ I know I should have been in a worse ! ” 

“ Perhaps — but why ? Why should any one 
have been terrified ? The poor thing had lost 
her body, it is true, but there she was notwith- 
standing — all the same! It might be nicer or 
not so nice to her, but why should it so affect 
me ? that’s what I want to know ! Am I not, 
as Hamlet says, ‘a thing immortal as itself’? 
I don’t see the sense of it ! Sure I am that 
one meets constantly — sits down with, eats and 
drinks with, hears sing, and play, and remark 

on the weather, and the fate of the nation, ” 

He paused, his eyes fixed on Walter. 

“ What are you driving at ? ” said Lufa. 

“ I was thinking of a much more fearful kind 
of creature,” he answered. 


THE BODILESS. 


155 


“ What kind of creature ? ” she asked. 

“ A creature,” he said slowly, “ that has a 
body, but no soul to it. All body, with brain 
enough for its affairs, it has no soul. Such 
will never wander about after they are dead ! 
there will be nothing to wander ! Good night, 
ladies ! Were I to tell you the history of a 
woman whose acquaintance I made some years 
ago at Baden, you would understand the sort. 
Good night ! ” 

There was silence for a moment or two. Had 
his sister not been present, something other than 
complimentary to Sefton might have crept about 
the drawing-room — to judge from the expression 
of two or three faces. Walter felt the man worth 
knowing, but felt also something about him that 
/epelled him. 


6 


i$6 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XX. 

THE SOULLESS. 

In his room, Walter threw himself in a chair, 
and sat without thinking, for the mental 
presence of Lufa was hardly thought. Gradually 
Sefton’s story revived, and for a time displaced 
the image of Lufa. It was the first immedi- 
ately authenticated ghost - narration he had 
ever heard. His fancy alone had hitherto 
been attracted by such tales ; but this brought 
him close to things of import as profound as 
marvellous. He began to wonder how he 
was likely to carry himself in such an inter- 
view. Courage such as Mr. Sefton’s he dared 
not claim — any more than hope for the dis- 
tinction of ever putting his hand through a 


THE SOULLESS. 1 5/ 

ghost! To be sure, the question philosophically 
considered, Sefton could have done no such 
thing ; for where no relation existed, he reasoned* 
or rather assumed, the one could not be materi- 
ally present to the other ; a fortiori there could 
be no passing of the one through the other! 
Where the ghost was, the hand was ; both 
existed in the same space at the same time ; 
therefore the one did not penetrate the other! 
The ghost, he held, never saw Sefton, knew or 
thought of his presence, or was aware of any 
intrusive outrage from his hand ! He shrank 
none the less, however, from such phantasmic 
presence as Sefton had described ; a man’s 
philosophy made but a fool of him when it 
came to the pinch ! He would indeed like to 
see a ghost, but not to be alone with one ! 

Here came back to him a certain look in 
Lufa’s face, which he had not understood : was 
it possible she knew something about the thing ? 
Could this be the house where it took place, 
where the ghost appeared ? The room in which 


i5» 


HOME AGAIN. 


he sat was very old ! the pictures in it none but 
for their age would hang up on any wall ! And 
the bed was a huger and gloomier than he had 
ever elsewhere seen ! It was on the second 
floor too ! What if this was the very room the 
officer slept in ! 

He must run into port, find shelter from the 
terrors of the shoreless sea of the unknown ! 
But all the harbour he could seek, was bed and 
closed eyes ! The dark is a strange refuge from 
the darkness— yet that which most men seek. 
It is so dark ! let us go further from the light ! 
Thus deeper they go, and come upon greater 
terrors ! He undressed hurriedly, blew out his 
candles, and by the light of the fire, -glowing 
rather than blazing, plunged into the expanse 
which glimmered before him like a lake of 
sleep in the moonshine of dreams. 

The moment he laid down his head, he 
became aware of what seemed unnatural stillness. 
Throughout the evening a strong wind had been 
blowing about the house ; it had ceased, and 


THE SOULLESS. 1 59 

without having noted the tumult, he was now 
aware of the calm. But what made him so 
cold ? The surface of the linen was like a film 
of ice ! He rolled himself round, and like a 
hedgehog sought shelter within the circum- 
ference of his own person. But he could not 
get warm, lie close as he might to his own 
door ; there was no admittance ! Had the room 
turned suddenly cold ? Could it be that the 
ghost was near, making the air like that of the 
sepulchre from which she had issued ? for such 
ghosts as walk the world at night, what refuge 
so fit as their tombs in the daytime ! The 
thought was a worse horror than he had known 
himself capable of feeling. He shivered with 
the cold. It seemed to pierce to his very bones. 
A strange and hideous constriction seized the 
muscles of his neck and throat : had not Sefton 
described the sensation ? Was it not a sure 
sign of ghostly presence ? 

How much longer he could have endured, or 
what would have been the result of the pro- 


i6o 


HOME AGAIN. 


longation of his suffering, I cannot tell. Molly 
would have found immediate refuge with him 
to whom belong all the ghosts wherever they 
roam or rest — with him who can deliver from 
the terrors of the night as well as from the 
perplexities of the day ; but Walter felt his 
lonely being exposed on all sides. 

The handle of the door moved. I am not 
sure whether ghosts always enter and leave a 
room in silence, but the sound horribly shook 
Walter’s nerves, and nearly made an end of him 
for a time. But a voice said, “ May I come in ? ” 
What he answered or whether he answered, 
Walter could not have told, but his terror sub- 
sided. The door opened wider, some one 
entered, closed it softly, and approached the bed 
through the dull firelight. 

“ I did not think you would be in bed ! ” said 
the voice, which Walter now knew for Sefton’s ; 
“ but at the risk of waking you, even of giving 
you a sleepless night, I must have a little talk 
with you l ” 


THE SOULLESS. 


l6l 

“ I shall be glad,” answered Walter. 

Sefton little thought how welcome was his 
visit ! 

But he was come to do him a service for 
which he could hardly at once be grateful. The 
best things done for any are generally those for 
which they are at the moment least grateful ; it 
needs the result of the service to make them 
able to prize it. 

Walter thought he had more of the story to 
tell — something he had not chosen to talk of 
to the ladies. 

Sefton stood, and for a few moments there 
was silence. He seemed to be meditating, yet 
looked like one who wanted to light his cigar. 

“ Won’t you take a seat ? ” said Walter. 

“ Thank you ! ” returned Sefton, and sat on 
the bed. 

“ I am twenty-seven,” he said at length. 
“ How old are you ? ” 

“Twenty-three,” answered Walter. 

“When I was twenty-three, I knew ever so 


HOME AGAIN. 


162 

much more than I do now ! I’m not half so sure 
about things as I was. I wonder if you will 
find it so ! ” 

“I hope I shall — otherwise I shan’t have got on.” 

“Well, now, couldn’t you just — why not? — 
forestall your experience by making use of mine ? 
I’m talking like a fool, I know, but never mind ; 
it is the more genuine! Look here, Mr. Colman ! 
I like you, and believe you will one day be 
something more than a gentleman. There, that 
won’t do ! What’s my opinion, good or bad, to 
you ! Listen to me anyhow : you’re on the 
wrong tack here, old boy ! ” 

“I’m sorry I don’t understand you,” said 
Walter. 

“Naturally not; how could you? I will 
explain.” 

“Please. Don’t mind me. I shall do my 
best not to be offended.” 

“ That is more than I should have presumed 
to ask.” 

Again a brief silence followed. 


THE SOULLESS. 1 63 

“You heard my story about the ghost ?” said 
Sefton. 

“ I was on the point of asking you if I might 
tell it in print ! ” 

“You may do what you like with it, except 
the other fellow’s part” 

“Thank you. — But I wish you would tell me 
what you meant by that other more fearful — 
apparition — or what did you call it ? Were you 
alluding to the vampire ? ” 

“ No. There are live women worse than 
vampires. Scared as I confess I was, I would 
rather meet ten such ghosts as I told you of, 
than another woman such as I mean. I know 
one, and she’s enough. By the time you had 
seen ten ghosts you would have got used to 
them, and found there was no danger from 
them ; but a woman without a soul will devour 
any number of men. You see she’s all room 
inside ! Look here ! I must be open with you : 
tell me you are not in love with my cousin Lufa, 
and I will bid you good night.” 


HOME AGAIN. 


164 

“ I am so much in love with her, that I 
dare not think what may come of it,” replied 
Walter. 

“ Then for God’s sake tell her, and have done 
with it ! Anything will be better than going 
on like this. I will not say what Lufa is ; 
indeed I don’t know what name would at all 
fit her! You think me a queer, dry, odd sort 
of a customer : I was different when I fell 
in love with Lufa. She is older than you think 
her, though not so old as I am. I kept saying 
to myself she was hardly a woman yet ; I must 
give her time. I was better brought up than 
she ; I thought things of consequence that she 
thought of none. I hadn’t a stupid ordinary 
mother like hers. She’s my second cousin. 
She took my love-making, never drew me on, 
never pushed me back ; never refused my love, 
never returned it. Whatever I did or said, she 
seemed content She was always writing 
poetry. ‘ But where’s her own poetry ? ’ I 
would say to myself. I was always trying to 


THE SOULLESS. 1 6 $ 

get nearer to what I admired ; she never 
seemed to suspect the least relation between the 
ideal, and life, between thought and action. 
To have an ideal implied no aspiration after it ! 
She has not a thought of the smallest obligation 
to carry out one of the fine things she writes of, 
any more than people that go to church think 
they have anything to do with what they hear 
there. Most people’s nature seems all in pieces. 
They wear and change their moods as they wear 
and change their dresses. Their moods make 
them, and not they their moods. They are differ- 
ent with every different mood. But Lufa seems 
never to change, and yet never to be in one and 
the same mood. She is always in two moods, 
and the one mood has nothing to do with the 
other. The one mood never influences, never 
modifies the other. They run side by side and 
do not mingle. The one mood is enthusiasm 
for what is not, the other indifference to what 
is. She has no faintest desire to make what 
is not into what is. For love, I believe all 


1 66 


HOME AGAIN. 


she knows about it is, that it is a fine thing 
to be loved. She loves nobody but her mother, 
and her only after a fashion. I had my leg 
broken in the hunting-field once ; my horse got 
up and galloped off ; I lay still. She saw what 
had happened, and went after the hounds. She 
said she could do no good ; Dr. Black was in the 
field, and she went to find him. She didn’t find 
him, and he didn’t come. I believe she forgot. 
But it’s worth telling you, though it has nothing 
to do with her, that I wasn’t forgot. Old True- 
foot went straight home, and kept wheeling and 
tearing up and down before the windows, but, 
till his own groom came, would let no one touch 
him. Then when he would have led him to the 
stable, he set his fore feet out in front of him, 
and wouldn’t budge. The groom got on his 
back, but was scarce in the saddle when True- 
foot was off' in a bee-line over everything to 
where I was lying. There’s a horse for you ! 
And there’s a woman ! — I’m telling you all this, 
mind, not to blame her, but to warn you. 


THE SOULLESS. 1 67 

Whether she is to -blame or not, I don’t know ; 
I don’t understand her. 

“ I was free to come and go, and say what 
I pleased, for both families favoured the match. 
She never objected ; never said she would not 
have me ; said she liked me as well as any other. 
In a word she would have married me, if I would 
have taken her. There are men, I believe, who 
would make the best of such a consent, saying 
they were so in love with the woman they would 
rejoice to take her on any terms : I don’t under- 
stand that sort of love ! I would as soon think 
of marrying a worfian I hated as a woman that 
did not love me. I know no reason why any 
woman should love me, and if no woman can 
find any, I must go alone. Lufa has found 
none yet, and life and love too seem to have 
gone out of me waiting. If you ask me why 
I do not give it all up, I have no answer. You 
will say for Lufa, it is only that the right man 
is not come ! It may be so ; but I believe 
there is more than that in it I fear she is all 


1 68 


HOME AGAIN. 


outside. It is true her poetry is even passionate 
sometimes ; but I suspect all her inspiration 
comes of the poetry she reads, not of the nature 
or human nature around her ; it comes of 
ambition, not of love. I don’t know much 
about verse, but to me there is an air of artifi- 
ciality about all hers. I cannot understand how 
you could praise her long poem so much — if 
you were in love with her. She has grown to 
me like the ghost I told you of. I put out my 
hand to her, and it goes through her. It makes 
me feel dead myself to be with her. I wonder 
sometimes how it would be if suddenly she said 
she loved me. Should I love her, or should we 
have changed parts ? She is very dainty — very 
lady-like — but womanly ! At one time — and for 
this I am now punished — the ambition to wake 
love in her had no small part in my feeling 
toward her — ambition to be the first and only 
man so to move her: despair has long cured 
me of that ; but not before I had come to love 
her in a way I cannot now understand. Why 


THE SOULLESS. 1 69 

I should love her I cannot tell ; and were it not 
that I scorn to marry her without love, I should 
despise my very love. You are thinking, ‘Well 
then, the way is clear for me ! ” It is ; I only 
want to prepare you for what I am confident 
will follow : you will have the heart taken out 
of you ! — That you are poor will be little 
obstacle if she loves you. She is the heiress, 
and can do much as she pleases. If she were 
in love, she would be obstinate. It must be in 
her somewhere, you will say, else how could she 
write as she does? But, I say again, look at 
the multitudes that go to church, and communi- 
cate, with whose being religion has no more to 
do than with that of Satan 1 I’ve said my say. 
Good night i ” 

He rose, and stood. 

He had not uttered the depth of what ho 
feared concerning Lufa — that she was simply, 
unobtrusively, unconsciously, absolutely selfish. 

Walter had listened with a beating heart, now 
full of hope that he was to be Hildebrand to 


170 HOME AGAIN. 

this Undine, now sick with the conviction that 
he was destined to fare no better that Sefton. 

“ Let me have my say before you go/’ he 
protested. “ It will sound as presumptuous in 
your ears as it does in mine — but what is to be 
done except put the thing to the question ? ” 
“There is nothing else. That is all I want. 
You must not go on like this. It is sucking the 
life out of you. I can’t bear to see it. Pray 
do not misunderstand me.” 

“That is impossible,” returned Walter. 

Not a wink did he sleep that night. But 
ever and again across his anxiety, throughout 
the dark hours, came the flattering thought that 
she had never loved man yet, and he was 
teaching her to love. He did not doubt Sefton, 
but Sefton might be right only for himself! 


( 1 7 1 ) 


CHAPTER XXI. 

THE LAST RIDE. 

In the morning, as Walter was dressing, he 
received a copy of his poems which he had taken 
in sheets to a bookbinder to put in morocco 
for lady Lufa. Pleased like a child, he handled 
it as if he might hurt it. Such a feeling he 
had never had before, would never have again. 
He was an author! One might think, after 
the way in which he had treated not a few 
books and not a few authors, he could scarcely 
consider it such a very fine thing to be an 
author ; but there is always a difference between 
thine and mine, treated by the man of this world 
as essential. The book was Walter’s book and 
not another’s ! — no common prose or poetry 
this, but the first-born of his deepest feeling! 


172 HOME AGAIN. 

At length it had taken body and shape ! From 
the unseen it had emerged in red morocco, the 
colour of his heart, its edges golden with the 
light of his hopes ! 

As to the communication of the night, its 
pain had nearly vanished. Was not Sefton a 
disappointed lover ? His honesty, however 
evident, could not alter that fact ! Least of all 
could a man himself tell whether disguised 
jealousy and lingering hope might not be 
potently present, while he believed himself 
solely influenced by friendly anxiety ! 

“ I will take his advice, however,” said Walter 
to himself, “ and put an end to my anxiety this 
very day ! ” 

“ Do you feel inclined for a gallop, Mr. 
Colman ? ” asked Lufa as they sat at the 
breakfast-table. “It feels just like a spring 
morning. The wind changed in the night. 
You won’t mind a little mud — will you ? ” 

In common phrase, but with a foolish look 
of adoring gratitude, Walter accepted the invi- 


THE LAST RIDE. 1 73 

tation. “ How handsome he is ! ” thought Lufa ; 
for Walter’s countenance was not only hand- 
some but expressive. Most women, however, 
found him attractive chiefly from his frank 
address and open look ; for, though yet far from 
a true man, he was of a true nature. Every 
man’s nature indeed is true, though the man 
be not true ; but some have come into the world 
so much nearer the point where they may begin 
to be true, that, comparing them with the rest, 
we say their nature is true. 

Lufa rose and went to get ready. Walter 
followed, and overtook her on the stair. 

“ I have something for you,” he said ; “ may 
1 bring it you ? ” 

He could not postpone the effect his book 
might have. Authors young and old think so 
much of their books that they seldom conceive 
how little others care about them. 

She was hardly in her room, when he followed 
her with the volume. 

She took it, and opened it 


174 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Yours!” she cried. “And poetry! Why, 
Walter ! ” 

She had once or twice called him by his name 
before. 

He took it from her hand, and turning the 
title page, gave it her again to read the dedi- 
cation. A slight rose-tinge suffused her face. 
She said nothing, but shut the book, and gave 
it a tender little hug. 

“ She never did that to anything Sefton gave 
her ! ” thought Walter. 

“ Make haste,” she said, and turning, went 
in, and closed her door. 

He walked up and down the hall for half an 
hour before she appeared. When she came 
tripping down the wide, softly descending stair, 
in her tight-fitting habit and hat and feather, 
holding up her skirt, so that he saw her feet 
racing each other like a little cataract across the 
steps, saying as she came near him, “I have 
kept you waiting, but I could not help it ; my 
habit was torn ! ” he thought he had never seen 


THE LAST RIDE. 


175 


her so lovely. Indeed she looked lovely, and 
had she loved, would have been lovely. As it 
was, her outer loveliness was but a promise 
whose fulfilment had been too long postponed. 
His heart swelled into his throat and eyes as 
he followed her, and helped her to mount. 

“ Nobody puts me up so well as you ! ” she 
said. 

He could hardly repress the triumph that 
filled him from head to foot. Anyhow, and 
whoever might object, she liked him ! If she 
loved him and would confess it, he could live 
on the pride of it all the rest of his days ! 

They were unattended, but neither spoke until 
they were well beyond the lodge-gate. Winter 
though it was, a sweet air was all abroad, and 
the day was full of spring-prophecies : all 
winters have such days, even those of the 
heart ! how could we get through without them ! 
Their horses were in excellent spirits — it was 
their first gallop for more than a week ; Walter’s 
roan was like a flame under him. They gave 


176 HOME AGAIN. 

them so much to do, that no such talk as Walter 
longed for, was possible. It consoled him, how- 
ever, to think that he had never had such a 
chance of letting Lufa see he could ride. 

At length, after a great gallop, they were 
quieter, seeming to remember they were horses 
and not colts, and must not overpass the limits 
of equine propriety. 

“ Is it our last ride, Lufa ? ” said Walter. 

“ Why should it be ? ” she answered, opening 
her eyes wide on him. 

“ There is no reason I know,” he returned, 
“ except — except you are tired of me.” 

“ Nobody is tired of you — except perhaps 
George, and you need not mind him ; he is 
odd. I have known him from childhood, and 
don’t understand him yet.” 

“ He is clever ! ” said Walter. 

“ I dare say he is — if he would take the trouble 
to show it.” 

“ You hardly do him justice, I think ! ” 

“ How can I ? he bores me ! and when I am 


THE LAST RIDE. 


177 


bored, I am horribly bored. I have been very 
patient with him.” 

“ Why do you ask him so often then ? ” 

“ I don’t ask him. Mamma is fond of him, 

and so ” 

“ You are the victim ! ” 

“ I can bear it ; I have consolations ! ” 

She laughed merrily. 

“How do you like my binding?” he asked, 
when they had ridden a while in silence. 

She looked up with a question. 

“The binding of my book, I mean,” he ex- 
plained. 

“ It is a good colour.” 

He felt his hope rather damped. 

“Will you let me read a little from it?” 
“With pleasure. You shall have an audience 
in the drawing-room, after luncheon.” 

“Oh, Lufa! how could you think I would 
read my own poems to a lot of people ! ” 

“ I beg your pardon ! Will the summer-house 
do?” 


I/S 


HOME AGAIN. 


“Yes, indeed ; nowhere better.” 

“ Very well! The summer-house, after lunch!” 

This was not encouraging ! Did she suspect 
what was coming? and was she careful not to 
lead the way to it? She had never been like 
this before ! Perhaps she did not like having 
the book dedicated to her ! But there was no 
mention of her name, or anything to let “ the 
heartless world ” know to whom it was offered ! 

As they approached the house, Walter said, 

“ Would you mind coming at once to the 
summer-house ? ” 

“ Lunch will be ready.” 

“Then sit down in your habit, and come 
immediately after. Let me have my way for 
once, Lufa.” 

“ Very well.” 


( 179 ) 


CHAPTER XXII. 

THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 

The moment the meal was over, he left the 
room, and in five minutes they met at the place 
appointed — a building like a miniature Roman 
temple. 

“ Oh,” said Lufa as she entered, “ I forgot the 
book ! How stupid of me ! ” 

“Never mind,” returned Walter. “It was 
you, not the book I wanted.” 

A broad bench went round the circular wall ; 
Lufa seated herself on it, and Walter placed 
himself beside her, as near as he dared. For 
some moments he did not speak. She looked 
up at him inquiringly. He sank at her feet, 
bowed his head toward her, and but for lack of 
courage would have laid it on her knees. 


i8o 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Oh Lufa ! ” he said, “ you eannot think how 
I love you ! ” 

“ Poor, dear boy ! ” she returned, in the tone 
of a careless mother to whom a son has un- 
burdened his sorrows, and laid her hand lightly 
on his curls. 

The words were not repellent, but neither was 
the tone encouraging. 

“You do not mind my saying it?” he resumed, 
feeling his way timidly. 

“What could you do but tell me?” she 
answered. “What could I do for you if you 
did not let me know ! I’m so sorry, Walter ! ” 

“Why should you be sorry? You can do 
with me as you please ! ” 

“ I don’t know about such things. I don’t 
quite know what you mean, or what you want. 
I will be as kind to you as I can — while you 
stay with us.” 

“But, Lufa — I may call you Lufa?” 

“ Yes, surely ! if that is any comfort to you.” 

“ Nothing but your love, Lufa, can be a 


THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 


181 

comfort to me. That would make me one of 
the blessed ! ” 

“ I like you very much. If you were a girl, I 
should say I loved you.” 

“ Why not say it as it is ? ” 

“ Would you be content with the love I should 
give a girl ? Some of you want so much ! ” 

“ I will be glad of any love you can give me. 
But to say I should be content with a7iy love you 
could give me, would be false. My love to you 
is such, I don’t know how to bear it ! It aches 
so ! My heart is full of you, and longs for you 
till I can hardly endure the pain. You are so 
beautiful that your beauty burns me. Night nor 
day can I forget you ! ” 

“You try to forget me then ?” 

“ Never. Your eyes have so dazzled my soul 
that I can see nothing but your eyes. — Do look 
at me — just for one moment, Lufa.” 

She turned her face and looked him straight 
in the eyes — looked into them as if they were 
windows through which she could peer into the 


HOME AGAIN. 


182 

convolutions of his brain. She held her eyes 
steady until his dropped, unable to sustain the 
nearness of her presence. 

“You see,” she said, “I am ready to do any- 
thing I can to please you ! ” 

He felt strangely defeated, rose, and sat down 
beside her again, with the sickness of a hot 
summer-noon in his soul. But he must leave 
no room for mistake ! He had been dreaming 
long enough ! What had not Sefton told him ! 

“ Is it possible you do not understand, Lufa, 
what a man means when he says, * I love you’?” 
“ I think I do ! I don’t mind it ! ” 

“ That means you will love me again ? ” 

“ Yes ; I will be good to you.” 

“You will love me as a woman loves a man?” 
“ I will let you love me as much as you 
please.” 

“To love you as much as I please, would be 
to call you my own ; to marry you ; to say 
wife to you ; to have you altogether, with 
nobody to come between, or try to stop my 


THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 1 83 

worshipping of you — not father, not mother — 
nobody ! ” 

“Now -you are foolish, Walter! You know I 
never meant that! You must have known that 
never could be ! I never imagined you could 
make such a fantastic blunder ! But then how 
should you know how we think about things ! I 
must remember that, and not be hard upon 
you ! ” 

“You mean that your father and mother 
would not like it ? ” 

“There it is! You do not understand! I 
thought so ! I do not mean my father and 
mother in particular ; I mean our people — 
people of our position — I would say rank , but 
that might hurt you ! We are brought up so 
differently from you, that you cannot understand 
how we think of such things. It grieves me to 
appear unkind, but really, Walter! There 'is 
not a man I love more than you — but marriage ! 
— Lady Lufa would be in everybody’s mouth, 
the same as if I had run off with my groom ! 


HOME AGAIN. 


184 

Our people are so blind that, believe me, they 
would hardly see the difference. The thing 
is simply impossible ! ” 

“ It would not be impossible if you loved 
me!” 

“Then I don’t, never did, never could love 
you. Don’t imagine you can persuade me to 
anything unbecoming, anything treacherous to 
my people ! You will find yourself awfully 
mistaken ! ” 

“ But I may make myself a name ! If I were 
as famous as lord Tennyson, would it be just as 
impossible ?” 

“To say it would not, would be to confess 
myself worldly, and that I never was ! No, 
Walter ; I admire you ; if you could be trusted 
not to misunderstand, I might even say I loved 
you ! I shall always be glad to see you, always 
enjoy hearing you read ; but there is a line as 
impassable as the Persian river of death. Talk 
about something else, or I must go ! ” 

Here Walter, who had been shivering with 


THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 1 85 

cold, began to grow warm again as he an- 
swered : — 

“ How could you write that poem, lady Lufa 
— full of such grand things about love, declaring 
love everything and rank nothing ; and then, 
when it came to yourself, treat me like this ! I 
could not have believed it possible ! You can- 
not know what love is, however much you write 
about it ! ” 

“ I hope I never shall, if it means any con- 
fusion between friendship and folly! It shall not 
make a fool of me ! I will not be talked about ! 
It is all very well and very right in poetry! The 
idea of letting all go for love is so splendid, it 
is the greatest pity it should be impossible. 
There may be some planet, whose social habits 
are different, where it might work well enough ; 
but here it is not to be thought of — except in 
poetry, of course, or novels. Of all human re- 
lations, the idea of such love is certainly the 
fittest for verse, therefore we have no choice ; we 
must use it. But because I think with pleasure 


HOME AGAIN. 


1 86 

of such lovers, why must I consent to be looked 
at with pleasure myself? What obligation does 
my heroine lay on me to do likewise ? I don’t 
see the thing. I don’t want to pose as a lover. 
Why should I fall in love with you in real life, 
because I like you to read my poem about 
lovers? Can’t you see the absurdity of the 
argument? Life and books are two different 
spheres. The one is the sphere of thoughts, 
the other of things, and they don’t touch.” 

But for pride, Walter could have wept with 
shame : why should he care that one with s jch 
principles should grant or refuse him anything ! 
Yet he did care ! 

“ There is no reason at all,” she resumed, 
“ why we should not be friends. Mr. Colman, 
I am not a flirt. It is in my heart to be a sister 
to you ! I would have you the first to con- 
gratulate me when the man appears whom 
I may choose to love as you mean ! He need 
not be a poet to make you jealous ! If he were, 
I should yet always regard you as my poet.” 


THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 1 87 

"And you would let me kiss your shoe, or 
perhaps your glove, if I was very good 1 ” said 
Walter. 

She took no notice of the outburst : it was 
but a bit of childish temper ! 

"You must learn,” she went on, "to keep 
your life and your imagination apart. You are 
always letting them mix, and that confuses 
everything. A poet of all men ought not to 
make the mistake. It is quite monstrous ! as 
monstrous as if a painter joined the halves of 

two different animals ! Poetry is so unlike life, 

* 

that to carry the one into the other is to make 
the poet a ridiculous parody of a man ! The 
moment that, instead of standing aloof and 
regarding, he plunges in, he becomes a traitor 
to his art, and is no longer able to represent 
things as they ought to be, but cannot be. My 
mother and I will open to you the best doors in 
London because we like you ; but pray do not 
dream of more. Do, please, Walter, leave it 
possible for me to say I like you — oh, so much!” 

7 


1 88 


HOME AGAIN. 


She had been staring out of the window as 
she spoke ; now she turned her eyes upon him 
where he sat, crushed and broken, beside her. 
A breath of compassion seemed to ruffle the 
cold lake of her spirit, and she looked at him 
in silence for a moment. He did not raise his 
eyes, but her tone made her present to his 
whole being as she said, 

“ I don't want to break your heart, my poet ! 
It was a lovely thought — why did you spoil it ? 
— that we two understood and loved each other 
in a way nobody could have a right to interfere 
with!” 

Walter lifted his head. The word loved 
wrought on him like a spell : he was sadly a 
creature of words ! He looked at her with 
flushed face and flashing eyes. Often had Lufa 
thought him handsome, but she had never felt 
it as she did now. 

“ Let it be so ! ” he said. “ Be my sister- 
friend, Lufa. Leave it only to me to remember 
how foolish I once made myself in your beautiful 


THE SUMMER-HOUSE. 189 

eyes — how miserable always in my own blind 
heart.” 

So little of a man was our poet, that out of 
pure disappointment and self-pity he burst into 
a passion of weeping. The world seemed lost 
to him, as it has seemed at such a time to many 
a better man. But to the true the truth of 
things will sooner or later assert itself, and 
neither this world nor the next prove lost to 
him. A man’s wellbeing does not depend on 
any woman. The woman did not create, and 
could not have contented him. No woman can 
ruin a man by refusing him, or even by accepting 
him, though she may go far toward it. There 
is one who has upon him a perfect claim, at 
the entrancing recognition of which he will one 
day cry out, “ This, then, is what it all meant ! ” 
The lamp of poetry may for a time go out in 
the heart of the poet, and nature seem a blank ; 
but where the truth is, the poetry must be ; and 
truth is, however the untrue may fail to see it. 
Surely that man is a fool who, on the ground 


190 


HOME AGAIN. 


that there cannot be such a God as other fools 
assert, or such a God as alone he is able to 
imagine, says there is no God ! 

Lufa’s bosom heaved, and she gave a little 
sob ; her sentiment, the skin of her heart, was 
touched, for the thing was pathetic ! A mist 
came over her eyes, and might, had she ever 
wept, have turned to tears. 

Walter sat with his head in his hands and 
wept She had never before seen a man weep, 
yet never a tear left its heavenly spring to flow 
from her eyes ! She rose, took his face between 
her hands, raised it, and kissed him on the fore- 

p 

head. 

He rose also, suddenly calmed. 

“ Then it was our last ride, Lufa ! ” he said, 
and left the summer-house. 


( i9i ) 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

THE PARK. 

Walter did not know where he was going 
when he turned from Lufa. It was solitude 
he sought, without being aware that he sought 
anything. Must it not be a deep spiritual in- 
stinct that drives trouble into solitude ? There 
are times when only the highest can comfort 
even the lowest, and solitude is the antechamber 
to his presence. With him is the only pos- 
sibility of essential comfort, the comfort that 
turns an evil into a good. But it was certainly 
not knowledge of this that drove Walter into 
the wide, lonely park. “ Away from men ! ” 
moans the wounded life. Away from the herd 
flies the wounded deer; away from the flock 
staggers the sickly sheep — to the solitary covert 


192 


HOME AGAIN. 


to die. The man too thinks it is to die ; but it 
is in truth so to return to life — if indeed he be a 
man, and not an abortion that can console him- 
self with vile consolations. “You cannot soothe 
me, my friends ! leave me to my misery,” cries 
the man ; and lo his misery is the wind of the 
waving garments of him that walks in the garden 
in the cool of the day ! All misery is God 
unknown. 

Hurt and bleeding Walter wandered away. 
His life was palled with a sudden hail-cloud 
which hung low, and blotted out colour and 
light and loveliness. It was the afternoon ; the 
sun was fast going down ; the dreary north wind 
had begun again to blow, and the trees to moan 
in response ; they seemed to say, “ How sad 
thou art, wind of winter! see how sad thou 
makest us ! we moan and shiver ! each alone, 
we are sad ! ” The sorrow of nature was all 
about him ; but the sighing of the wind-sifting 
trees around his head, and the hardening of the 
earth about the ancient roots under his feet, was 


THE PARK. 


193 


better than the glow of the bright drawing-room, 
with its lamps and blazing fires, its warm colours 
and caressing softnesses. Who would take joy 
in paradise with hell in his heart ! Let him 
stay out in the night with the suffering, groan- 
ing trees, with the clouds that have swallowed 
the moon and the stars, with the frost and the 
silent gathering of the companies, troops, and 
battalions of snow ! 

Every man understands something of what 
Walter felt. His soul was seared with cold. 
The ways of life were a dull sickness. There 
was no reason why things should be, why the 
world should ever have been made ! The night 
was come : why should he keep awake ! How 
cold the river looked in its low, wet channel! 
How listlessly the long grasses hung over its 
bank ! And the boy on the other side was 
whistling ! 

It grew darker. He had made a long round, 
and unaware was approaching the house. He 
had not thought what he must do. Nothing so 


194 


HOME AGAIN. 


practical as going away had yet occurred to 
him. She had not been unkind ! She had 
even pressed on him a sister’s love ! The moth 
had not yet burned away enough of its wings 
to prevent it from burning its whole body ! 
it kept fluttering about the flame. Nor was 
absent the childish weakness, the unmanly but 
common impulse, to make the woman feel how 
miserable she had made him. For this poor 
satisfaction, not a few men have blown their 
brains out ; not a few women drowned them- 
selves or taken poison — and generally without 
success ! Walter would stand before her the 
ruin she had made him, then vanish from her 
sight. To-morrow he would leave the house, 
but she must see him yet once, alone, before he 
went ! Once more he must hang his shrivelled 
pinions in the presence of the seraph whose 
radiance had scorched him ! And still the most 
hideous thought of all would keep lifting its 
vague ugly head out of chaos — the thought 
that, lovely as she was, she was not worshipful. 


THE PARK. 


195 


The windows were dimly shining through 
their thick curtains. The house looked a great 
jewel of bliss, in which the spirits of paradise 
might come and go, while such as he could not 
enter ! What should he do ? Where should 
he go? To his room, and dress for dinner? 
It was impossible ! How could he sit feeling 
her eyes, and facing Sefton ! How endure the 
company, the talk, the horrible eating ! All 
so lately full of refinement, of enchantment — 
the music, the pictures, the easy intercourse 
— all was stupid, wearisome, meaningless ! He 
would go to his room and say he had a head- 
ache ! But first he would peep into the draw- 
ing-room : she might be there — and looking 
sad ! 


HOME AGAIN, 


196 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE DRAWING-ROOM. 

He opened a door into one of the smaller com- 
partments of the drawing-room, looked, crept 
in, and closed the door behind him. 

Lufa was there — alone ! He durst not ap- 
proach her, but if he seated himself in a certain 
corner, he could see her and she him ! He 
did not, however, apprehend that the corner he 
had chosen was entirely in shadow, or reflect that 
the globe of a lamp was almost straight between 
them. He thought she saw him, but she did not. 

The room seemed to fold him round’ with 
softness as he entered from the dreary night ; 
and he could not help being pervaded by the 
warmth, and weakened by the bodily comfort. 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 197 

He sat and gazed at his goddess — a mere idol, 
seeming, not being, until he hardly knew 
whether she was actually before him, or only 
present to his thought. She was indeed a little 
pale — but that she always was when quiet ; no 
sorrow, not a shadow was on her face. She 
seemed brooding, but over nothing painful. At 
length she smiled. 

“She is pleased to think that I love her!” 
thought Walter. “ She leans to me a little ! 
When the gray hair comes and the wrinkles, 
it will be a gracious memory that she was so 
loved by one who had but his life to give 
her! ‘ He was poor,’ she will say, ‘but I have 
not found the riches he would have given me ! 
1 have been greatly loved ! ’ ” 

I believe myself, she was ruminating a verse 
that had come to her in the summer-house, 
while Walter was weeping by her side. 

A door opened, and Sefton came in. 

“Have you seen the Onlooker $” he said — a 
journal at the time in much favour with the 


198 HOME AGAIN. 

more educated populace. “ There is a review in 
it that would amuse you.” 

“ Of what ? ” she asked listlessly. 

“ I didn’t notice the name of the book, but it 
is a poem, and just your sort, I should say. 
The article is in the Onlooker's best style.” 

“ Pray let me see it ! ” she answered, holding 
out her hand. 

“ I will read it to you, if I may.” 

She did not object. He sat down a little way 
from her, and read. 

He had not gone far before Walter knew, 
although its name had not occurred as Sefton 
read, that the book was his own. The discovery 
enraged him : how had the reviewer got hold of 
it when he himself had seen no copy except 
Lufa’s ? It was a puzzle he never got at the root 
of. Probably someone he had offended had 
contrived to see as much of it, at the printer’s 
or binder’s, as had enabled him to forestall its 
appearance with the most stinging, mocking, 
playfully insolent paper that had ever rejoiced 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 


199 


the readers of the Onlooker . But he had more 
to complain of than rudeness, a thing of which 
I doubt if any reviewer is ever aware. For he 
soon found that, by the blunder of reviewer or 
printer, the best of the verses quoted were 
misquoted, and so rendered worthy of the 
epithet attached to them. This unpleasant dis- 
covery was presently followed by another — that 
the rudest and most contemptuous personal 
remark was founded on an ignorant misappre- 
hension of the reviewer’s own ; while in ridicule 
of a mere misprint which happened to carry 
a comic suggestion on the face of it, the 
reviewer surpassed himself. 

As Sefton read, Lufa laughed often and 
heartily : the thing was gamesomely, cleverly, 
almost brilliantly written. Annoyed as he was, 
Walter did not fail to note, however, that Sefton 
did not stop to let Lufa laugh, but read quietly 
on. Suddenly she caught the paper from his 
hand, for she was quick as a kitten, saying : 

“ I must see who the author of the precious 
book is ! ” 


200 


HOME AGAIN. 


Her cousin did not interfere, but sat watching 
her — almost solemnly. 

“ Ah, I thought so ! ” she cried, with a shriek 
of laughter. “ I thought so ! I could hardly be 
mistaken ! What will the poor fellow say to it ! 
It will kill him ! ” She laughed immoderately. 
“ I hope it will give him a lesson, however ! ” 
she went on. “ It is most amusing to see how 
much he thinks of his own verses ! He 
worships them ! And then makes up for the 
idolatry by handling without mercy those of 
other people ! It was he who so maltreated my 
poor first ! I never saw anything so unfair in 
my life ! ” 

Sefton said nothing, but looked grim. 

“You should see — I will show it you — the 
gorgeous copy of this same comical stuff he 
gave me to-day ! I am so glad he is going : 
he won’t be able to ask me how I like it, and 
I shan’t have to tell a story ! I’m sorry for him, 
though — truly ! He is a very nice sort of boy, 
though rather presuming. I must find out who 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 


201 


the writer of that review is, and get mamma to 
invite him ! He is a host in himself ! I don’t 
think I ever read anything so clever — or more 
just!” 

“ Oh, then, you have read the book ? ” spoke 
her cousin at length. 

“ No ; but ain’t those extracts enough ? Don’t 
they speak for themselves — for their silliness and 
sentimentality ? ” 

“ How would you like a book of yours judged 
by scraps chopped off anywhere, Lufa ! — or 
chosen for the look they would have in the 
humorous frame of the critic’s remarks ! It is 
less than fair ! I do not feel that I know in the 
least what sort of book this is. I only know 
that again and again, having happened to come 
afterwards upon the book itself, I have set down 
the reviewer as a knave, who for ends of his own 
did not scruple to make fools of his readers. I 
am ashamed, Lufa, that you should so accept 
everything as gospel against a man who believes 
you his friend ! ” 


202 


HOME AGAIN. 


Walter’s heart had been as water, now it 
had turned to ice, and with the coldness came 
strength : he could bear anything except this 
desert of a woman. The moment Sefton had 
thus spoken, he rose and came forward — not so 
much, I imagine, to Sefton’s surprise as Lufa’s, 
and said, 

“ Thank you, Mr. Sefton, for undeceiving me. 
I owe you, lady Lufa, the debt of a deep dis- 
trust hereafter of poetic ladies.” 

“ They will hardly be annihilated by it, Mr. 
Colman 1 ” returned Lufa. “ But, indeed, I did 
not know you were in the room ; and perhaps 
you did not know that in our circle it is counted 
bad manners to listen ! ” 

“ I was foolishly paralyzed for a moment,” 
said Walter, “ as well as unprepared for the part 
you would take.” 

“ I am very glad, Mr. Colman,” said Sefton, 
“ that you have had the opportunity of discover- 
ing the truth ! My cousin well deserves the 
pillory in which I know you will not place her 1 ” 


/ 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 


203 


“ Lady Lufa needs fear nothing from me. I 
have some regard left for the idea of her — the 
thing she is not ! If you will be kind, come and 
help me out of the house.” 

“ There is no train to-night.* 

“ I will wait at the station for the slow train.” 

“ I cannot press you to stay an hour where 

you have been so treated, but ” 

“ It is high time I went ! ” said Walter — not 
without the dignity that endurance gives. “ May 
I ask you to do one thing for me, Mr. Sefton ? ” 
“ Twenty things, if I can.” 

Then please send my portmanteau after me.” 
With that he left the room, and went to his 
own, far on the way of cure, though not quite so 
far as he imagined. The blood, however, was 
surging healthily through his veins: he had 
been made a fool of, but he would be a wiser 
man for it ! 

He had hardly closed his door when Sefton 
appeared. 

“ Can I help you ? ” he said. 


204 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ To pack my portmanteau ? Did you ever 
pack your own ? ” 

“ Oftener than you, I suspect ! I never had 
but one orderly I could bear about me, and he’s 
dead, poor fellow ! I shall see him again, 
though, I do trust, let believers in dirt say 
what they will ! Never till I myself think no 
more, will I cease hoping to see my old Archie 
again ! Fellows must learn something through 
the Lufas, or they would make raving maniacs 
of us! God be thanked, he has her in his 
great idiot-cage, and will do something with 
her yet ! May you and I be there to see when 
she comes out in her right mind ! ” 

“ Amen ! ” said Walter. 

“ And now, my dear fellow,” said Sefton, “ if 
you will listen to me, you will not go till to- 
morrow morning. — No, I don’t want you to stay 
to breakfast! You shall go by the early train 
as any other visitor might. The least scrap of 
a note to lady Tremaine, and all will go without 
remark.” 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 


205 


He waited in silence. Walter went on put- 
ting up his things. 

" I daresay you are right ! ” he said at length. 
“ I will stay till the morning. But you will not 
ask me to go down again ? ” 

“ It would be a victory if you could ! ” 

“Very well, I will. I am a fool, but this 
much less of a fool, that I know I am one.” 

Somehow Walter had a sense of relief. He 
began to dress, and spent some pains on the 
process. He felt sure Sefton would take care 
the Onlooker should not be seen — before his 
departure anyhow. During dinner he talked 
almost brilliantly, making Lufa open her eyes 
without knowing she did. 

He retired at length to his room with very 
mingled feelings. There was the closing para- 
graph of the most interesting chapter of his 
life yet constructed ! What was to follow? 

Into the gulf of an empty heart 
Something must always come . 

“ What will it be ? ” I think with a start, 

And a fear that makes me dumb 


20 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


I cannot sit at my outer gate 
And call what shall soothe my grief ; 

I cannot unlock to a king in state, 

Cannot bar a wind-swept leafl 

Hopeless were I if a loving Care 
Sat not at the spring of my thought — 

At the birth of my history, blank and bare, 

Of the thing I have not wrought. 

If God were not, this hollow need, 

All that I now call vie , 

Might wallow with demons of hate and greed 
In a lawless and shoreless sea ! 

Watch the door of this sepulchre, 

Sit, my Lord, on the stone, 

Till the life within it rise and stir, 

And walk forth to claim its own. 

This was how Walter felt and wrote some 
twelve months after, when he had come to 
understand a little of the process that had been 
conducted in him ; when he knew that the life 
he had been living was a mere life in death, a 
being not worth being. 

But the knowledge of this process had not yet 
begun. A thousand subtle influences, wrapt in 
the tattered cloak of dull old Time, had to come 


THE DRAWING-ROOM. 


207 


into secret, potent play, ere he would be able 
to write thus. 

And even this paragraph was not yet quite at 
an end. 


208 


HOME AGAIN, 


CHAPTER XXV. 

A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 

WALTER drew his table near the fire, and sat 
down to concoct a brief note of thanks and fare- 
well to his hostess informing her that he was 
compelled to leave in haste. He found it rather 
difficult, though what Lufa might tell her 
mother, he neither thought nor cared, if only 
he had his back to the house, and his soul out 
of it. It was now the one place on the earth 
which he would sink in the abyss of forgetfulness. 

He could not get the note to his mind, falling 
constantly into thought that led nowhither, 
and at last threw himself back in his chair, 
wearied with the emotions of the day. Under 
the soothing influence of the heat and the 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 20g 

lambent motions of the flames, he fell into 
a condition which was not sleep, and as little 
was waking. His childhood crept back to him, 
with all the delights of the sacred time when 
home was the universe, and father and mother 
the divinities that filled it. A something now 
vanished from his life, looked at him across a 
gulf of lapse, and said, “ Am I likewise false ? 
The present you desire to forget ; you say, it 
were better it had never been : do you wish I 
too had never been ? Why else have you left 
my soul in the grave of oblivion ? ” Thus talking 
with his past, he fell asleep. 

It could have been but for a few minutes, 
though when he woke it seemed a century had 
passed, he had dreamed of so much. But some- 
thing had happened ! What was it ? The fire 
was blazing as before, but he was chilled to 
the marrow ! A wind seemed blowing upon 
him, cold as if it issued from the jaws of 
the sepulchre ! His imagination and memory 
together linked the time to the night of Sefton’s 


210 


HOME AGAIN. 


warning : was the ghost now really come ? Had 
Sefton’s presence only saved him from her for 
the time ? He sat bolt upright in his chair 
listening, the same horror upon him as then. 
It seemed minutes he thus sat motionless, but 
moments of fearful expectation are long drawn 
out ; their nature is of centuries, not years. 
One thing was certain, and one only — that 
there was a wind, and a very cold one, blowing 
upon him. He stared at the door. It moved. 
It opened a little. A light tap followed. He 
could not speak. Then came a louder, and the 
spell was broken. He started to his feet, 
and with the courage of terror extreme, 
opened the door — not opened it a little, as 
if he feared an unwelcome human presence, 
but pulled it, with a sudden wide yawn, open as 
the grave ! 

There stood no bodiless soul, but soulless 
Lufa ! 

He stood aside, and invited her to enter. 
Little as he desired to see her, it was a relief 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 


21 1 


that it was she, and not an elderly lady in 
brown silk, through whose person you might 
thrust your hand without injury or offence. 

As a reward of his promptitude in opening 
the door, he caught sight of lady Tremaine 
disappearing in the corridor. 

Lady Lufa walked in without a word, and 
Walter followed her, leaving the door wide. 
She seated herself in the chair he had just left, 
and turned to him with a quiet, magisterial air, 
as if she sat on the seat of judgment. 

“You had better shut the door,” she said. 

“ I thought lady Tremaine might wish to 
hear,” answered Walter. 

“Not at all. She only lighted me to the 
door.” 

“As you please,” said Walter, and having 
done as she requested, returned, and stood 
before her. 

“Will you not take a seat ? ” she said, in the 
tone of — “You may sit down.” 

“Your ladyship will excuse me!” he answered. 


212 


HOME AGAIN. 


She gave a condescending motion to her 
pretty neck, and said, 

“ I need hardly explain, Mr. Colman, why I 
have sought this interview. You must by this 
time be aware how peculiar, how unreasonable 
indeed, your behaviour was ! ” 

“ Pardon me ! I do not see the necessity 
for a word on the matter. I leave by the first 
train in the morning ! ” 

“ I will not dwell on the rudeness of listen- 
ing ” 

“To a review of my own book read by a 
friend ! ” interrupted Walter, with indignation ; 
“ — in a drawing-room where I sat right in front 
of you, and knew no reason why you should not 
see me! I did make a great mistake, but it 
was in trusting a lady who, an hour or two 
before, had offered to be my sister ! How 
could I suspect she might speak of me in a way 
she would not like me to hear ! ” 

Lady Lufa was not quite prepared for the 
tone he took. She had expected to find him 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 21 3 

easy to cow. Her object was to bring him into 
humble acceptance of the treatment against 
which he had rebelled, lest he should afterward 
avenge himself! She sat a moment in silence. 

“ Such ignorance of the ways of the world,” she 
said, “ is excusable in a poet — especially ” 

“ Such a poet ! ” supplemented Walter, who 
found it difficult to keep his temper in face of 
her arrogance. 

“ But the world is made up of those that 
laugh and those that are laughed at.” 

4 ‘ They change places, however, sometimes ! ” 
said Walter — which alarmed Lufa, though she 
did not show her anxiety. 

“ Certainly!” she replied. “ Everybody laughs 
at everybody when he gets a chance ! What is 
society but a club for mutual criticism ! The 
business of its members is to pass judgment on 
each other ! Why not take the accident, which 
seems so to annoy you, with the philosophy of a 
gentleman — like one of us ! None of us think 
anything of what is said of us ; we do not heed 


214 


HOME AGAIN. 


what we say of each other ! Everyone knows 
that all his friends pull him to pieces the 
moment he is out of sight — as heartily as they 
had just been assisting him to pull others to 
pieces. Every gathering is a temporary com- 
mittee, composed of those who are present, and 
sitting upon those who are not present. Nobody 
dreams of courtesy extending beyond presence ! 
when that is over, obligation is over. Any such 
imaginary restriction would render society im- 
possible. It is only the most inexperienced 
person that could suppose things going on in 
his absence the same as in his presence ! It is 
I who ought to be pitied, not you 1 I am the 
loser, not you ! ” 

Walter bowed and was silent. He did not 
yet see her drift. If his regard had been worth 
anything, she certainly had lost a good deal, but, 
as it was, he did not understand how the loss 
could be of importance to her. 

With sudden change of tone and expression, 
she broke out — 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 


215 


“ Be generous, Walter ! Forgive me. I will 
make any atonement you please, and never again 
speak of you as if you were not my own 
brother ! ” 

“ It is not of the least consequence how you 
speak of me now, lady Lufa: I have had the good 
though painful fortune to learn your real feel- 
ings, and prefer the truth to the most agreeable 
deception. Your worst opinion of me I could 
have borne and loved you still; but there is 
nothing of you, no appearance of anything even, 
left to love ! I know now that a woman may 
be sweet as Hybla honey, and false as an apple 
of Sodom ! ” 

“ Well, you are ungenerous ! I hope there are 
not many in the world to whom one might con- 
fess a fault and not be forgiven. This is indeed 
humiliating ! ” 

“ I beg your pardon ; I heard no confession ! ” 

“ I asked you to forgive me.” 

“ For what ? ” 

“ For talking of you as I did.” 


21 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Which you justified as the custom of 
society ! ” 

“ I confess, then, that in your case I ought not 
to have done so.” 

“ Then I forgive you ; and we part in peace.” 
“ Is that what you call forgiveness ? ” 

“ Is it not all that is required ? Knowing now 
your true feeling toward me, I know that in this 
house I am a mistake. Nothing like a true 
relation exists, nothing more than the merest 
acquaintance can exist between us ! ” 

“ It is terrible to have such an enemy ! ” 

“ I do not understand you ! ” 

“ The match is not fair ! Here stands poor me 
undefended, chained to the rock ! There you 
lurk, behind the hedge, invisible, and taking 
every advantage ! Do you think it fair ? ” 

“ I begin to understand ! The objection did 
not seem to strike you while I was the person 
shot at ! But still I fail to see your object. 
Please explain.” 

“You must know perfectly what I mean, 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 


217 


Walter! and I cannot but believe you too just 
to allow a personal misunderstanding to influence 
your public judgment! You gave your real 
unbiassed opinion of my last book, and you are 
bound by that ! ” 

“ Is it possible,” cried Walter, “that at last I 
understand you ! That you should come to me 
on such an errand, lady Lufa, reveals yet more 
your opinion of me ! Could you believe me 
capable of such vileness as to take my revenge 
by abusing your work ? ” 

“ Ah, no ! — Promise me you will not.” 

“If such a promise were necessary, how could 
it set you at your ease ? The man who could do 
such a thing would break any promise ! ” 

“ Then whatever rudeness is offered me in your 
journal, I shall take as springing from your 
resentment ! ” 

“If you do, you will wrong me far worse than 
you have yet done. I shall not merely never 
review work of yours, I will never utter an 
opinion of it to any man.” 


218 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ Thank you. So we part friends ! ” 

“ Conventionally.” 

She rose. He turned to the door and opened 
it. She passed him, her head thrown back, her 
eyes looking poisonous, and let a gaze of con- 
temptuous doubt rest on him for a moment. 
His eyes did not quail before hers. 

She had left a taper burning on a slab out- 
side the door. Walter had but half closed it 
behind her when she reappeared with the taper 
in one hand and the volume he had given her 
in the other. He took the book without a 
word, and again she went ; but he had hardly 
thrown it on the hot coals when once more she 
appeared. I believe she had herself blown her 
taper out. 

“ Let me have a light, please,” she said. 

He took the taper from her hand, and turned 
to light it. She followed him into the room, and 
laid her hand on his arm. 

“ Walter,” she said, “ it was all because of 
Sefton ! He does not like you, and can’t bear 


A MIDNIGHT INTERVIEW. 219 

me to like you ! I am engaged to him. I ought 
to have told you ! ” 

“ I will congratulate him next time I see him!" 
said Walter. 

“ No, no ! ” she cried, looking at once angry 
and scared. 

“I will not, then," answered Walter; “but 
allow me to say I do not believe Sefton dislikes 
me. Anyhow, keep your mind at ease, pray. I 
shall certainly not in any way revenge myself. ” 

She looked up in his eyes with a momentary 
glimmer of her old sweetness, said “ Thank 
you ! ” gently, and left the room. Her last glance 
left a faint, sad sting in Walters heart, and he 
began to think whether he had not been too 
hard upon her. In any case, the sooner he was 
out of the house the better ! He must no more 
trifle with the girl, than a dipsomaniac with the 
brandy bottle ! 

All the time of this last scene, the gorgeous 
book was frizzling and curling and cracking on 

the embers. Whether she saw it or not I cannot 

8 


220 


HOME AGAIN. 


say, but she was followed all along the corridor 
by the smell of the burning leather, which got 
into some sleeping noses, and made their owners 
dream the house was on fire. 

In the morning, Sefton woke him, helped him 
to dress, got him away in time, and went with 
him to the station. Not a word passed between 
them about Lufa. All the way to London 
Walter pondered whether there could be any 
reality in what she had said about Sefton. Was 
it not possible that she might have imagined 
him jealous ? Sefton’s dislike of her treatment 
of him might to her have seemed displeasure 
at her familiarity with him ! “ And indeed,” 

thought Walter, “ there are few friends who care 
so much for any author, I suspect, as to be in- 
dignant with his reviewers 1 ” 


( 221 ) 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

A PERIOD. 

If London was dreary when Lufa left it, it was 
worse than dreary to Walter now that she was 
gone from his world ; gone from the universe 
past and future both — for the Lufa he had 
dreamed of was not, and had never been ! He 
had no longer any one to dream about, waking 
or asleep. The space she had occupied was a 
blank spot, black and cold, charred with the fire 
of passion, cracked with the frost of disappoint- 
ment and scorn. It had its intellectual trouble 
too — the impossibility of bringing together the 
long-cherished idea of Lufa, and the reality of 
Lufa revealed by herself ; the two stared at 
each other in mortal irreconcilement. Now also, 


222 


HOME AGAIN. 


he had no book to occupy him with pleasant 
labour. It had passed from him into the dark ; 
the thought of it was painful, almost loathsome 
to him. No one, however, he was glad to find, 
referred to it. His friends pitied him, and his 
foes were silent. Three copies of it were sold. 
The sneaking review had had influence enough 
with the courted public to annihilate it. 

But the expenses of printing it remained ; he 
had yet to pay his share of them ; and, alas, 
he did not know how ! The publisher would 
give him time, no doubt, but, work his hardest, 
it would be a slow clearance ! There was the 
shame too of having undertaken what he was 
unable at once to fulfil ! He set himself to grind 
and starve. 

At times the clouds would close in upon him, 
and there would seem nothing in life worth 
living for ; though in truth his life was so much 
the more valuable that Lufa was out of it. 
Occasionally his heart would grow very gentle 
toward her, and he would burrow for possible 


A PERIOD. 


223 


way to her excuse. But his conclusion was ever 
the same: how could he forget that laugh of utter 
merriment and delight when she found it was 
indeed himself under the castigation of such a 
mighty beadle of literature ! In his most melting 
mood, therefore, he could only pity her. But 
what would have become of him had she not thus 
unmasked herself! He would now be believing 
her the truest, best of women, with no fault but 
a coldness of which he had no right to complain, 
a coldness comforted by the extent of its freezing ! 

But there was far more to make London 
miserable to him : he was now at last disgusted 
with his trade : this continuous feeding on the 
labour of others was no work for a gentleman ! 
he began to descry in it certain analogies which 
grew more and more unpleasant as he regarded 
them. For his poetizing he was sick of that also. 
True, the quality or value of what he had written 
was nowise in itself affected by its failure to meet 
acceptance. It had certainly not had fair play ; 
it had been represented as it was not ; its char- 


224 


HOME AGAIN. 


acter had been lied away! But now that the 
blinding influence of their chief subject was 
removed, he saw the verses themselves to be 
little worth. The soul of them was not the grand 
all-informing love, but his own private self- 
seeking little passion for a poor show of the 
lovable. No one could care for such verses, 
except indeed it were some dumb soul in love 
with a woman like, or imaginably like the 
woman of their thin worship ! Not a few were 
pretty, he allowed, and some were quaint — that 
is, had curious old-flavoured phrases and fantastic 
turns of thought ; but throughout there was no 
revelation ! They sparkled too with the names 
of things in themselves beautiful, but whether 
these things were in general wisely or fairly used 
in his figures and tropes and comparisons, he 
was now more than doubtful. He had put on 
his singing robes to whisper his secret love into 
the two great red ears of the public ! — desiring, 
not sympathy from love and truth, but recognition 
from fame and report ! That he had not received 


A PERIOD. 225 

it was better than he deserved ! Then what a 
life was it thus to lie wallowing among the mush- 
rooms of the press ! To spend gifts which, 
whatever they were, were divine, in publishing 
the tidings that this man had done ill, that 
other had done well, that he was amusing, and 
she was dull ! Was it worth calling work, only 
because it was hard and dreary? His con- 
science, his taste, his impulses, all declined to 
back him in it any longer. What was he 
doing for the world ? they asked him. How 
many books had he guided men to read, by 
whose help they might steer their way through 
the shoals of life? He could count on the 
fingers of one hand such as he had heartily 
recommended. If he had but pointed out what 
was good in books otherwise poor, it would 
have been something ! He had not found it easy 
to be at once clever, honest, and serviceable to 
his race : the press was but for the utterance of 
opinion, true or false, not for the education of 
thought! And why should such as he write 


226 


HOME AGAIN. 


books, who had nothing to tell men that could 
make them braver, stronger, purer, more loving, 
less selfish ! 

What next was to be done ? His calling had 
vanished ! It was not work worthy of a man ! 
It was contemptible as that of the parson to 
whom the church is a profession ! He owed his 
landlady money: how was he to pay her? He 
must eat, or how was he to work ? There must 
be something honest for him to do ! Was a 
man to do the wrong in order to do the right ? 

The true Walter was waking — beginning to 
see things as they were, and not as men regarded 
them. He was tormented with doubts and fears 
of all kinds, high and low. But for the change 
in his father’s circumstances, he would have asked 
his help, cleared off everything, and gone home 
at once ; and had he been truer to his father, he 
would have known that such a decision would 
even now have rejoiced his heart. 

He had no longer confidence enough to write 
on any social question. Of the books sent him, 


A PERIOD 227 

he chose such as seemed worthiest of notice, 
but could not do much. He felt not merely a 
growing disinclination, but a growing incapacity 
for the work. How much the feeling may have 
been increased by the fact that his health was 
giving way, I cannot tell ; but certainly the root 
of it was moral. 

His funds began to fail his immediate neces- 
sities, and he had just come from pawning the 
watch which he would have sold but that it had 
been his mother’s, and was the gift of his father, 
when he met Harold Sullivan, who persuaded 
him to go with him to a certain theatre in 
which the stalls had not yet entirely usurped 
upon the enjoyable portion of the pit. Between 
the first and second acts, he caught sight of 
lady Lufa in a box, with Sefton standing behind 
her. There was hardly a chance of their seeing 
him, and he regarded them at his ease, glad to 
see Sefton, and not sorry to see Lufa, for it was 
an opportunity of testing himself. He soon per- 
ceived that they held almost no communication 


228 


HOME AGAIN. 


with each other, but was not surprised, knowing 
in how peculiar a relation they stood. Lufa 
was not looking unhappy — far from it ; her 
countenance expressed absolute self-content- 
ment : in all parts of the house she was attract- 
ing attention, especially from the young men. 
Sefton’s look was certainly not one of content ; 
but neither, as certainly, was it one of discontent ; 
it suggested power waiting opportunity, strength 
quietly attendant upon, hardly expectant of the 
moment of activity. Walter imagined one 
watching a beloved cataleptic : till she came 
alive, what was to be done but wait ! God 
has had more waiting than any one else ! 
Lufa was an iceberg that would not melt even 
in the warm southward sea, watched by a still 
volcano, whose fires were of no avail, for they 
could not reach her. Sparklingly pretty, not 
radiantly beautiful, she sat, glancing, coruscating, 
glittering, anything except glowing : glow she 
could not even put on ! She did not know what 
it was. Now and then a soft sadness would for 


A PERIOD. 


229 


a moment settle on Sefton’s face — like the gray 
of a cloudy summer evening, about to gather 
into a warm rain ; but this was never when he 
looked at her ; it was only when, without seeing, 
he thought about her. Hitherto Walter had not 
been capable of understanding the devotion, the 
quiet strength, the persistent purpose of the 
man ; now he began to see into it and wonder. 
While a spark of hope lay alive in those ashes 
of disappointment that had often seemed as if 
they would make but a dust-heap of his bosom, 
there he must remain, by the clean, cold hearth, 
swept and garnished, of the woman he loved — 
loved strangely, mysteriously, inexplicably even 
to himself! 

Walter sat gazing ; and as he gazed, simul- 
taneously the two became aware of his presence. 
A friendly smile spread over Sefton’s face, but, 
with quick perception, he abstained from any 
.movement that might seem to claim recognition. 
To Walter’s wonder, Lufa, so perfectly self- 
contained, so unchangingly self - obedient, 


230 


HOME AGAIN. 


coloured — faintly indeed, but plainly enough to 
the eyes of one so well used to the white rose 
of her countenance. She moved neither head 
nor person, only turned her eyes away, and 
seemed, like the dove for its foot, to seek some 
resting-place for her vision — and with the sight 
awoke in Walter the first unselfish resolve of 
his life. Would he not do anything — could he 
not do something to bring those two together ? 
The thought seemed even to himself almost a 
foolish one ; but spiritual relations and potencies 
go far beyond intellectual ones, and a man must 
become a fool to be wise. Many a foolish 
thought, many a most improbable idea, has 
proved itself seed-bearing fruit of the kingdom 
of heaven. A man may fail to effect, or be 
unable to set hand to work he would fain do — 
and be judged, as Browning says in his Saul, 
by what he would have done if he could. Only 
the would must be as true as a deed ; then it 
is a deed. The kingdom of heaven is for the 
dreamers of true dreams only 1 


A PERIOD. 


231 


Was there then anything Walter could do to 
help the man to gain the woman he had so 
faithfully helped Walter to lose ? It was no 
plain task. The thing was not to enable him 
to marry her — that Sefton could have done 
long ago — might do anyday without help from 
him ! As she then was, she was no gain for 
any true man ! But if he could help to open 
the eyes of the cold-hearted, conceited, foolish 
girl, either to her own valuelessness as she 
was, or her worth as she might be, or again 
to the value, the eternal treasure of the heart 
she was turning from, she would then be a gift 
that in the giving grew worthy even of such a 
man ! 

Here, however, came a different thought, 
bearing nevertheless in the same direction. It 
was very well to think of Lufa’s behaviour to 
Sefton, but what had Walter’s been to Lufa ? 
It may seem strange that the reflection had not 
come to him before; but in nothing are we slower 
than in discovering our own blame— and the 


232 


HOME AGAIN. 


slower that we are so quick to perceive or 
imagine we perceive the blame of others. For, 
the very fact that we see and heartily condemn 
the faults of others, we use, unconsciously per- 
haps, as an argument that we must be right 
ourselves. We must take heed not to judge 
with the idea that so we shall escape judgment 
— that by condemning evil we clear ourselves. 
Walter’s eyes were opened to see that he had 
done Lufa a great wrong ; that he had helped 
immensely to buttress and exalt her self-esteem. 
Had he not in his whole behaviour toward her, 
been far more anxious that he should please 
her than that she should be worthy? Had he 
not known that she was far more anxious to be 
accepted as a poet than to be admired as a 
woman ? — more anxious indeed to be accepted 
than, even in the matter of her art, to be worthy 
of acceptance — to be the thing she wished to 
be thought ? In that review which, in spite of 
his own soul, he had persuaded himself to 
publish, knowing it to be false, had he not 


A PERIOD. 233 

actively, most unconscientiously, and altogether 
selfishly, done her serious intellectual wrong, 
and heavy moral injury ? Was he not bound to 
make what poor reparation might be possible ? 
It mattered nothing that she did not desire any 
such reparation ; that she would look upon 
the attempt as the first wrong in the affair — 
possibly as a pretence for the sake of insult, and 
the revenge of giving her the deepest possible 
pain : having told her the lies, he must confess 
they were lies ! having given her the poison of 
falsehood, he must at least follow it with the 
only antidote, the truth ! It was not his part 
to judge of consequences, so long as a duty 
remained to be done ! and what could be more 
a duty than to undeceive where he had deceived, 
especially where the deception was aggravating 
that worst of diseases, self-conceit, self-satisfac- 
tion, self-worship ? It was doubtful whether she 
would read what he might write ; but the fact 
.hat she did not trust him, that, notwithstanding 
his assurance, she would still be in fear of how 


234 HOME AGAIN. 

he might depreciate her work in the eyes of the 
public, would, he thought, secure for him a 
reading. She might, when she got far enough 
to see his drift, destroy the letter in disgust ; 
that would be the loss of his labour ; but he 
would have done what he could ! He had 
begun to turn a new leaf, and here was a thing 
the new leaf required written upon it 1 

As to Sefton, what better thing could he do 
for him, than make her think less of herself! 
or, if that were impossible, at least make her 
understand that other people did not think so 
much of her as she had been willingly led to 
believe ! In wronging her he had wronged his 
friend as well, throwing obstacles in the way 
of his reception ! He had wronged the truth 
itself! 

When the play was over, and the crowd was 
dispersing, he found himself close to them on 
the pavement as they waited for their carriage. 
So near to Lufa was he that he could not help 
touching her dress. But what a change had 


A PERIOD. 235 

passed on him ! Not once did he wish her to 
look round and brighten when she saw him ! 
Sefton, moved perhaps by that unknown power 
of presence, operating in bodily proximity, but 
savouring of the spiritual, looked suddenly 
round and saw him. He smiled and did not 
speak, but, stretching out a quiet hand, sought 
his. Walter grasped it as if it was come to lift 
him from some evil doom. Neither spoke, and 
Lufa did not know that hands had clasped 
in the swaying human flood. No psychical 
influence passed between Walter and her. 

Having made up his mind on the way, he set 
to work as soon as he reached home. He wrote 
and destroyed and rewrote, erased and substi- 
tuted, until, as near as he could, he had said 
what he intended, so at least as it should not 
be mistaken for what he did not intend, which is 
the main problem in writing. Then he copied 
all out fair and plain, so that she could read it 
easily — and here is his letter, word for word : 


236 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ My dear lady Lufa, 

“ In part by means of the severe 
lesson I received through you, a great change 
has passed upon me. I am no longer able to 
think of myself as the important person I used 
to take myself for. It is startling to have one’s 
eyes opened to see oneself as one is, but it very 
soon begins to make Gxie glad, and the gladness, 
I find, goes on growing. One’s nature is so 
elevated by being delivered from the honouring 
and valuing of that which is neither honourable 
nor valuable, that the seeming loss is annihilated 
by the essential gain ; the being better makes 
up — infinitely makes up for showing to myself 
worse. I would millions of times rather know 
myself a fool, than imagine myself a great poet. 
For to know oneself a fool is to begin to be 
wise ; and I would be loyal among the sane, 
not royal among lunatics. Who would be the 
highest, in virtue of the largest mistake, of the 
profoundest self-idolatry ! 

“ But it was not to tell you this I began to 


A PERIOD. 237 

write ; it was to confess a great wrong which 
once I did you ; for I cannot rest, I cannot 
make it up with my conscience until I have told 
you the truth. It may be you will dislike me 
more for confessing the wrong than for com- 
mitting it — I cannot tell ; but it is my part to 
let you know it — and none the less my part that 
I must therein confess myself more weak and 
foolish than already I appear. 

“You will remember that you gave me a copy 
of your drama while I was at your house : the 
review of it which appeared in the Battery I 
wrote that same night. I am ashamed to have 
to confess the fact, but I had taken more cham- 
pagne than, I hope, I ever shall again ; and, 
irreverent as it must seem to mention the fact in 
such a connection, I was possessed almost to 
insanity with your beauty, and the graciousness 
of your behaviour to me. Everything around me 
was pervaded with rose-colour and rose-odour, 
when, my head and heart, my imagination and 
senses, my memory and hope full of yourself, I 


233 


HOME AGAIN. 


sat down to read your poem. I was like one in 
an opium-dream. I saw everything in the glory 
of an everlasting sunset, for every word I read, 
I heard in the tones of your voice ; thorough the 
radiant consciousness of your present beauty, 
received every thought that awoke. If ever one 
being was possessed by another, I was that night 
possessed by you. In this mood, like that, I 
say again, of an opium-dream, I wrote the 
criticism of your book. 

“ But on the morning after the writing of it, 
I found, when I began to read it, I could so 
little enter into the feeling of it, that I could 
hardly believe I had actually written what lay 
before me in my own hand. I took the poem 
again, and scanned it most carefully, reading it 
with deep, anxious desire to justify the things I 
had set down. But I failed altogether. Even 
my love could not blind me enough to persuade 
me that what I had said was true, or that I 
should be other than false to print it. I had 
to put myself through a succession of special 


A PERIOD. 


239 


pleadings before I could quiet my conscience 
enough to let the thing go, and tell its lies in the 
ears of the disciples of the Battery. I will show 
you how falsely I dealt I said to myself that, 
in the first place, one mood had, in itself, as 
good a claim, with regard to the worth of what it 
produced, as another ; but that the opinion of 
the night, when the imagination was awake, was 
more likely to be just with regard to a poem, 
than that of the cold, hard, unpoetic day. I was 
wrong in taking it for granted that my moods 
had equal claims ; and the worse wrong, that all 
the time I knew I was not behaving honestly, 
for I persisted in leaving out, as factor in one of 
the moods, the champagne I had drunk, not to 
mention the time of the night, and the glamour 
of your influence. The latter was still present, 
but could no longer blind me to believe what I 
would, most of all things, have gladly believed. 
With the mood the judgment was altered, and a 
true judgment is the same in all moods, inhabit- 
ing a region above mood. 






240 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ In confession, a man must use plain words : 
I was a coward, a false friend, a false man. 
Having tried my hardest to keep myself from 
seeing the fact as plainly as I might have seen 
it, had I looked it in the face with the intent of 
meeting what the truth might render necessary, 
yet knowing that I was acting falsely, I sent off, 
regardless of duty, and in the sole desire of 
pleasing you, and had printed, as my opinion 
concerning your book, what was not my opinion, 
had never been my opinion, except during that 
one night of hallucination — a hallucination recog- 
nized as such, for the oftener I read, the more I 
was convinced that I had given such an opinion 
as must stamp me the most incompetent, or the 
falsest of critics. Lady Lufa, there is nothing 
remarkable in your poem. It is nicely, correctly 
written, and in parts skilfully contrived ; but 
had it been sent me among other books, and with- 
out indication of the author, I should certainly 
have thrown it aside as the attempt of a school- 
girl, who, having more pocket money than was 


A PERIOD. 


2 4 I 


good for her, had been able to print it without 
asking her parents or guardians. You may say 
this judgment is the outcome of my jealous 
disappointment ; I say the former was the out- 
come of my loving fascination ; and I cannot 
but think something in yourself will speak for 
me, and tell you that I am speaking honestly. 
Mr. Sefton considers me worthy of belief ; and I 
know myself worthier of belief than ever before 
— how much worthier than when I wrote that 
review ! Then I loved you — selfishly ; now I 
love the truth, and would serve you, though I do 
not love you the same way as before. Through 
the disappointment you caused me, my eyes 
have been opened to see the way in which I was 
going, and to turn from it, for I was on the way 
of falsehood. Oh, lady Lufa, let me speak ; 
forget my presumption ; you bore with my folly 
— bear now with what is true though it come 
from a foolish heart ! What would it be to 
us, if we gained the praises of the whole world, 
and found afterwards they were for what was 


242 


HOME AGAIN. 


counted of no value in the great universe into 
which we had passed ! Let us be true, what- 
ever come of it, and look the facts of things 
in the face ! If I am a poor creature, let 
me be content to know it ! for have I not the 
joy that God can make me great ! And is 
not the first step toward greatness, to refuse 
to call that great which is not great, or to 
think myself great when I am small? Is it not 
an essential and impassable bar to greatness, 
for a man to imagine himself great when there 
is not in him one single element of greatness? 
Let us confess ourselves that which we cannot 
consent to remain ! The confession of not being, 
is the sole foundation for becoming. Self is a 
quicksand ; God is the only rock. I have been 
learning a little. 

“ Having thus far dared, why should I not go 
farther, and say one thing more which is burning 
within me ! There was a time when I might 
have said it better in verse, but that time has 
gone by — to come again, I trust, when I have 


A PERIOD. 


243 


that to say which is worth saying ; when I shall 
be true enough to help my fellows to be true. 
The calling of a poet, if it be a calling, mus< 
come from heaven. To be bred to a thing is to 
have the ears closed to any call. 

“ There is a man I know who for ever sits 
watching, as one might watch at evening for the 
first star to come creeping out of the infinite 
heaven ; but it is for a higher and lovelier star 
this man watches; he is waiting for a woman, for 
the first dawn of her soul. He knows well the 
spot where the star of his hope must appear, the 
spot where, out of the vast unknown, she must 
open her shining eyes that he may love her. But 
alas, she will not arise and shine. He believes 
or at least hopes his star is on the way, and 
what can he do but wait, for he is laden with 
the burden of a wealth given him to give — 
the love of a true heart — the rarest, as the most 
precious thing on the face of this half-baked 
brick of a world. It was easy for me to love you, 
lady Lufa, while I took that for granted in you 


244 


HOME AGAIN. 


which did not yet exist in myself! But he knows 
the truth of you, and yet loves. Lady Lufa, 
you are not true ! If you do not know it, it is 
because you will not know it, lest the sight 
of what you are should unendurably urge you 
toward that you will not choose to be. God 
is my witness I speak in no poor anger, no 
mean jealousy ! Not a word I say is for my- 
self. I am but begging you to be that which 
God, making you, intended you to be. I would 
have the star shine through the cloud — shine 
on the heart of the watcher ! the real Lufa 
lies hidden under a dusky garment of un- 
truth ; none but the eye of God can see 
through to the lovely thing he made, out 
of which the false Lufa is smothering the 
life. When the beautiful child, the real Lufa, 
the thing you now know you are not, but 
ought to be, walks out like an angel from a 
sepulchre, then will the heart of God, and the 
heart of George Sefton, rejoice with a great 
joy. Think what the love of such a man is. 


A PERIOD. 


245 


It is your very self he loves ; he loves like God, 
even before the real self has begun to exist. 
It is not the beauty you show, but the beauty 
showing you, that he loves — the hidden self 
of your perfect idea. Outward beauty alone 
is not for the divine lover ; it is a mere show. 
Until the woman makes it real, it is but a 
show ; and until she makes it true, she is her- 
self a lie. With you, lady Lufa, it rests to 
make your beauty a truth, that is, a divine 
fact. 

“For myself, I have been but a false poet — 
a mask among poets, a builder with hay and 
stubble, babbling before I had words, singing 
before I had a song, without a ray of revelation 
from the world unseen, carving at clay instead 
of shaping it in the hope of marble. I am 
humbler now, and trust the divine humility has 
begun to work out mine. Of all things I would 
be true, and pretend nothing. 

“ Lady Lufa, if a woman’s shadow came out 
of her mirror, and went about the world pre- 


246 


HOME AGAIN. 


tending to be herself and deceiving the eyes 
of men, that figure thus walking the world 
and stealing hearts, would be you. Would 
to God I were such an exorcist as could lay 
that ghost of you ! as could say, ‘ Go back, 
forsake your seeming, false image of the true, 
the lovely Lufa that God made ! You are but 
her unmaking ! Get back into the mirror ; live 
but in the land of shows ; leave the true Lufa 
to wake from the swoon into which you have 
cast her ; she must live and grow, and become, 
till she is perfect in loveliness.’ 

“I shall know nothing of the fate of my words. 
I shall see you no more in this world — except 
it be as I saw you to-night, standing close to 
you in a crowd. The touch of your garment 
sent no thrill through me ; you were to me as a 
walking shadow. But the man who loves you 
sees the sleeping beauty within you! His lips are 
silent, but by the very silence of his lips his love 
speaks. I shall soon — but what matters it! If 
we are true, we shall meet, and have much to say. 


A PERIOD. 


247 


If we are not true, all we know is that false- 
hood must perish. For me, I will arise and go 
to my father, and lie no more. I will be a man, 
and live in the truth — try at least so to live, in 
the hope of one day being true. 

“Walter Colman” 

Walter sent the letter — posted it the next 
morning as he went to the office. It is many 
years since, and he has not heard of it yet. 
But there is nothing hidden that shall not be 
revealed. 

The writing of this letter was a great strain to 
him, but he felt much relieved when it was gone. 
How differently did he feel after that other lying, 
flattering utterance, with his half-sleeping con- 
science muttering and grumbling as it lay. He 
walked then full of pride and hope, in the mid- 
most of his dream of love and ambition ; now 
he was poor and sad ,and bowed down, but 
the earth was a place that might be lived in 
notwithstanding ! If only he could find some 


248 HOME AGAIN. 

thoroughly honest work ! He would rather have 
his weakness and dejection with his humility, than 
ten times the false pride with which he paced 
the street before. It was better to be thus 
than so ! 

But as he came home that night, he found 
himself far from well, and altogether incapable 
of work. He was indeed ill, for he could 
neither eat nor sleep, nor take interest in any- 
thing. His friend Sullivan was shocked to see 
him look so pale and wild, and insisted he must 
go home. Walter said it might be but a passing 
attack, and it would be a pity to alarm them ; 
he would wait a day or two. At length he 
felt so ill, that one morning he did not get 
up. There was no one in the house who cared 
to nurse him ; his landlady did little or nothing 
for him, beyond getting him the cup of tea he 
occasionally wanted ; Sullivan was himself ill, 
and for some days neither saw nor heard of 
him ; and Walter had such an experience of 
loneliness and desertion as he had never had 


A PERIOD. 


249 


before. But it was a purgatorial suffering. 
He began to learn how insufficient he was for 
himself ; how little self-sustaining power there 
was in him. Not there was the fountain of 
life ! Words that had been mere platitudes 
of theological commonplace, began to show a 
golden root through their ancient mould. The 
time came back to him when father and mother 
bent anxiously over their child. He re- 
membered how their love took from him all 
fear ; how even the pain seemed to melt in their 
presence ; all was right when they knew all 
about it ! they would see that the suffering went 
at the proper time ! All gentle ministrations to 
his comfort, the moving of his pillows, the things 
cooked by his mother’s own hands, her watch 
to play with — all came back, as if the tide of 
life had set in the other direction, and he was 
fast drifting back into childhood. What sleep 
he had was filled with alternate dreams of 
suffering and home-deliverance. He recalled 
how different his aunt had been when he was 


250 


HOME AGAIN. 


ill : in this isolation her face looking in at his 
door would have been as that of an angel ! And 
he knew that all the time his debts were increas- 
ing, and when would he begin to pay them off! 
His mind wandered; and when Sullivan came at 
length, he was talking wildly, imagining himself 
the prodigal son in the parable. 

Sullivan wrote at once to Mr. Colman. 


( 25 ‘ ) 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A FRUITLESS JOURNEY. 

It was the afternoon when Sullivan’s letter, on 
the lower left-hand corner of which he had 
written Har. Sul. f arrived. Mr. Colman had 
gone to a town at some distance, whence he 
would not return till the last train. Not many 
letters came to him, and this, with the London 
post-mark, naturally drew the attention of aunt 
Ann and Molly. The moment the eyes of the 
former fell on the contracted name in the corner, 
they blazed. 

“The shameless fellow!” she cried; “ — writing 
to beg another ten-pound-note from my poor 
foolish brother ! ” 

“ I don’t think that is it, aunt,” returned Molly. 

9 


252 


HOME AGAIN. 


“And why not, pray? How should you 
know ? ” 

“ Mr. Sullivan has had plenty of work, and 
cannot need to borrow money. — Why are you 
so suspicious, auntie ? ” 

“ I am not. I never was suspicious. You are 
a rude girl to say so ! If it is not money, you 
may depend upon it, it is something worse l ” 

“ What worse can you mean ? ” 

“That Walter has got into some scrape.” 

Why should he not write himself if it were 
so?” 

“ He is too much ashamed, and gets his friend 
to do it for him. I know the ways of young 
men ! ” 

“ Perhaps he is ill ! ” said Molly. 

“ Perhaps. It is long since I saw a letter from 
him ! I am never allowed to read or hear one ! ” 

“Can you wonder at that, when you are 
always abusing him? .If he were my son, 1 
should take care you never saw a scrap of his 
writing ! It makes me wild to hear those I love 


A FRUITLESS JOURNEY. 253 

talked of as you talk of him — always with a 
sniff! ” 

“Love, indeed! Do you suppose no one 
loves him but you ? ” 

“ His father loves him dearly!” 

“ How dare you hint that I do not love him !” 

“If yours is love, auntie, I wish I may never 
meet it where I’ve no chance of defending 
myself! ” 

Molly had a hot temper where her friends 
were concerned, though she would bear a good 
deal without retorting. 

“ There!” said aunt Ann, giving her the letter; 
“ put that on the mantlepiece till he comes.” 

Molly took it, and gazed wistfully at it, as if 
fain to read it through the envelope. She had 
had that morning a strange and painful dream 
about Walter — that he lay in his coffin, with a 
white cat across his face. 

“ What if he should be ill, auntie ? ” she said. 

“Who ill?” 

“Walter, of course ! ” 


254 


HOME AGAIN. 


“ What then ? We must wait to know ! ” 

“ Father wouldn’t mind if we just opened it to 
make sure it was not about Walter ! ” 

“Open my brother’s letter ! Goodness gracious, 
what next! Well, you are a girl ! I should just 
like to see him after you had opened one of 
his letters ! ” 

Miss Hancock had herself once done so — out 
of pure curiosity, though on another pretence — a 
letter, as it happened, which he would rather not 
have read himself than have had her read, for 
it contained thanks for a favour secretly done ; 
and he was more angry than any one had ever 
seen him. Molly remembered the occurrence, 
though she had been too young to have it 
explained to her ; but Molly’s idea of a father, 
and of Richard Colman as that father, was 
much grander than that of most children con- 
cerning fathers. There is indeed a much closer 
relation between some good men and any good 
child, than there is between far the greater 
number of parents and their children. 


A FRUITLESS JOURNEY. 


255 


She put the letter on the chimney-piece, and 
went to the dairy ; but it was to think about 
the letter. Her mind kept hovering about it 
where it stood on the chimney-piece, leaning 
against the vase with the bunch of silvery 
honesty in it. What if Walter was ill ! Her 
father would not be home till the last train, and 
there would be none to town before the slow 
train in the morning ! He might be very ill ! 
— and longing for some one to come to him — his 
father of course — longing all day long! Her 
father was as reasonable as he was loving : she 
was sure he would never be angry without 
reason ! He was a man with whom one who 
loved him, and was not presuming, might take 
any honest liberty ! He could hardly be a good 
man with whom one must never take a liberty ! 
A good man was not the man to stand on his 
dignity! To treat him as if he were, was to 
treat him as those who cannot trust in God 
behave to him ! They call him the supreme 
Ruler! the Almighty! the Disposer of events! 


256 


HOME AGAIN. 


the Judge of the whole earth! — and would not 
“presume ” to say “Father, help thy little child! ” 
She would not wrong her father by not trusting 
him ! she would open the letter ! she would not 
read one word more than was needful to know 
whether it came to say that Walter was ill ! 
Why should Mr. Sullivan have put his name 
outside, except to make sure of its being attended 
to immediately ! 

She went back to the room where lay the letter. 
Her aunt was there still. Molly was glad of it : 
the easiest way of letting her know, for she would 
not have done it without, was to let her see her 
do what she did ! She went straight to the 
chimney, reached up, and took the letter. 

“ Leave that alone ! ” cried Miss Hancock. “ I 
know what you are after! You want to give it 
to my brother, and be the first to know what is 
ia it ! Put it back this moment ! ” 

Molly stood with the letter in her hand. 

“You are mistaken, auntie,” she said. “I am 
going to open it.” 


A FRUITLESS JOURNEY. 257 

“You shall do nothing of the sort — not if 
I live ! ” returned aunt Ann, and flew to take 
the letter from her. 

But Molly was prepared for the attack, and 
was on the other side of the door before she 
could pounce. 

She sped to her room, locked the door, and 
read the letter, then went instantly to her bonnet 
and cloak. There was time to catch the last 
train ! She enclosed the letter, addressed it to 
her father, and wrote inside the envelope that 
she had opened it against the wish of her aunt, 
and was gone to nurse Walter. Then taking 
money from her drawer, she returned to aunt Ann. 

“It is about Walter. He is very ill,” she said. 
“ I have enclosed the letter, and told him it was 
I that opened it.” 

“Why such a fuss?” cried aunt Ann. “You 
can tell him your impertinence just as well as 
write it ! Oh, you’ve got your bonnet on ! — 
going to run away in a fright at what you’ve 
done I Well, perhaps you’d better ! ” 


2 5 8 


HOME AGAIN, 


“ I am going to Walter.” 

“ Where?” 

“To London to Walter.” 

“You!” 

“ Yes ; who else?” 

“You shall not. I will go myself!” 

Molly knew too well how Walter felt toward 
his aunt to consent to this. She would doubt- 
less behave kindly if she found him really ill, 
but she would hardly be a comfort to him ! 

“ I shall be ready in one moment ! ” continued 
Miss Hancock. “ There is plenty of time, and 
you can drive me to the station if you like. 
Richard shall not say I left the care of his son 
to a chit of a girl ! ” 

Molly said nothing, but rushed to the stable. 
Nobody was there ! She harnessed the horse, 
and put him to the dog-cart with her own hands, 
in terror lest her aunt should be ready before 
her. 

She was driving from the yard when her aunt 
appeared, in her Sunday-best. 


A FRUITLESS JOURNEY. 259 

“That’s right!” she said, expecting her to 
pull up and take her in. 

But Molly touched up her horse, and he, 
having done nothing for some time, was fresh, 
and started at speed. Aunt Ann was left 
standing, but it was some time before she 
understood that the horse had not run away. 

Ere Molly reached the station, she left the 
dog-cart at a neighbouring inn, then told one of 
the porters, to whom her father was well known, 
to look out for him by the last train, and let 
him know where the trap was. 

As the train was approaching London, it 
stopped at a station where already stood another 
train, bound in the opposite direction, which 
began to move while hers stood. Molly was 
looking out of her window, as it went past her 
with the slow beginnings of speed, watching the 
faces that drifted by, in a kind of phantasmagoric 
show, never more to be repeated, when, in the 
farther corner of a third-class carriage near the 
end of the train, she caught sight of a huddled 


260 


HOME AGAIN. 


figure that reminded her of Walter ; a pale face 
was staring as if it saw nothing, but dreamed 
of something it could not see. She jumped up 
and put her head out of the window, but her 
own train also was now moving, and if it were 
Walter, there was no possibility of overtaking 
him. She was by no means sure however that 
it was he. The only way was to go on to 
her journey’s end ! 

/ 


( 261 ) 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

DOING AND DREAMING. 

WALTER had passed a very troubled night, and 
was worse, though he thought himself better. 
His friend looked in to see him before going 
to the office, and told him that he would come 
again in the evening. He did not tell him that 
he had written to his father. 

Walter slept and woke and slept again. All 
the afternoon he was restless, as one who 
dreams without sleeping. The things presented 
to his mind, and seeming with him, were not 
those about him. Late in the afternoon, the 
fever abated a little, and he felt as one who 
wakes out of a dream. For a few minutes he 
lay staring into the room, then rose and with 
difficulty dressed himself, one moment shivering, 


262 


HOME AGAIN. 


the next burning. He knew perfectly what he 
was doing : his mind was possessed with an 
unappeasable longing and absolute determination 
to go home. The longing had been there all 
the night and all the day, except when it was 
quieted by the shadowy assuagement of his 
visions ; and now with the first return of his 
consciousness to present conditions, came resolve. 
Better die at home, he said to himself, than 
recover in such a horrible place ! On he went 
with his preparations, mechanical but methodical, 
till at last he put on his great coat, took his 
rug, searched his purse, found enough to pay 
a cab to the railway station, went softly down 
the stair, and was in the street, a man lonely 
and feeble, but with a great joy of escape. 
Happily a cab was just passing, and he was 
borne in safety, half asleep again after his exer- 
tions, to the station. There he sought the 
stationmaster, and telling him his condition, 
prevailed upon him to take his watch as a pledge 
that he would send him the price of his ticket. 


DOING AND DREAMING. 263 

It was a wet night, hut not very cold, and 
he did not suffer at first — was in fact more 
comfortable than he had been in bed. He 
seemed to himself perfectly sane when he 
started, but of the latter half of his journey 
he remembered nothing connectedly. What 
fragments of it returned to his recollection, 
appeared as the remnants of a feverish dream. 

The train arrived late in the dark night, at an 
iiour when a conveyance was rarely to be had. 
He remembered nothing, however, of setting 
out to v/alk homeland nothing clearly as to how 
he fared on the way. His dreaming memory 
gave him but a sense of climbing, climbing, with 
a cold wind buffeting him back, and bits of paper, 
which must have been snowflakes, beating in his 
face : he thought they were the shreds of the 
unsold copies of his book, torn to pieces by the 
angry publisher, and sent swirling about his face 
in clouds to annoy him. After that came a great 
blank. 

The same train had taken up Mr. Colman at 


264 HOME AGAIN. 

a junction. The moment he got out of it, the 
porter to whom Molly had spoken in the 
morning, addressed him, with the message 
Molly had left for him. Surprised and uneasy, 
he was putting some anxious questions to the 
man, when his son passed him. The night was 
still dark, and cloudy with snow, the wind was 
coming in gusts, now and then fiercely, and the 
lamps were wildly struggling against being 
blown out: neither saw the other. Walter 
staggered away, and Richard set out for the 
inn, to drive home as fast as possible : there 
only could he get light on Molly’s sudden 
departure for London! In her haste she had 
not left message enough. But he knew his son 
must be ill ; nothing else could have caused 
it ! He met with some delay at the inn, but at 
length was driving home as fast as he dared 
through the thick darkness of the rough ascent. 

He had not driven far, before one of those 
little accidents occurred to his harness which, 
small in themselves, have so often serious results : 


DOING AND DREAMING. 265 

the strap of the hames gave way, and the traces 
dropped by the horse’s sides. Mr. Col man 
never went unprovided for accidents, but in a 
dark night, in the middle of the road, with a 
horse fresh and eager to get home, it takes 
time to rectify anything. 

At length he arrived in safety, and having 
roused the man, hastened into the house. 
There he speedily learned the truth of his 
conjecture, and it was a great comfort to him 
that Molly had acted so promptly. But he 
bethought himself that, by driving to another 
station some miles farther off, at which a 
luggage train stopped in the night, he could 
reach town a few hours earlier. He went 
again to the stable, and gave orders to have 
the horse well fed and ready in an hour. 
Then he tried to eat the supper his sister-in- 
law had prepared for him, but with small 
success. Every few minutes he rose, opened 
the door, and looked out. It was a very 
dark morning, full of wind and snow. 


266 


HOME AGAIN. 


By and by he could bear it no longer, and 
though he knew there was much time to spare, 
got up to go to the stable. The wind met him 
with an angry blast as he opened the door, and 
sharp pellets of keen snow stung him in the 
face. He had taken a lantern in his hand, but, 
going with his head bent against the wind, he 
all but stumbled over a stone seat, where they 
would sit by the door of a summer evening. 
As he recovered himself, the light of his lan- 
tern fell upon a figure huddled crouching upon 
the seat, but in the very act of tumbling 
forward from off it. He caught it with one 
arm, set down the light, raised its head, 'and in 
the wild, worn, death-pale features and wander- 
ing eyes, knew the face of his son. He uttered 
one wailing groan, which seemed to spend his 
life, gathered him to his bosom, and taking him 
up like a child, almost ran to the house with 
him. As he went he heard at his ear the 
murmured words, 

“ Father, I have sinned . . . not worthy . . ? 


DOING AND DREAMING. 267 

His heart gave a great heave, but he uttered 
no second cry. 

Aunt Ann, however, had heard the first. 
She ran, and, opening the door, met him with 
the youth in his arms. 

“ I’m afraid he’s dead ! ” gasped Richard. 
“ He is cold as a stone ! ” 

Aunt Ann darted to the kitchen, made a 
blazing fire, set the kettle on it and bricks 
around it, then ran to see if she could help. 

Richard had got his boy into his own bed, 
had put off his own clothes, and was lying with 
him in his arms to warm him. Aunt Ann went 
about like a steam-engine, but noiseless. She 
got the hot bricks, then hot bottles, and more 
blankets. The father thought he would die 
before the heat got to him. As soon as he was 
a little warm, he mounted his horse, and rode 
to fetch the doctor. It was terrible to him to 
think that he must have passed his boy on the 
way, and left him to struggle home without 


2 68 


HOME AGAIN. 


Ere he returned, Walter had begun to show 
a little more life. He moaned and murmured, 
and seemed going through a succession of pain- 
ful events. Now he would utter a cry of disgust, 
now call out for his father ; then he would be 
fighting the storm with a wild despair of ever 
reaching his father. 

The doctor came, examined him, said they 
were doing quite right, but looked solemn over 
him. 

Had it not been for that glimpse she had 
at the station where last the train stopped, Molly 
would have been in misery indeed when, on 
arriving at Walter’s lodging, and being told that 
he was ill in bed, she went up to his room, and 
could find him nowhere. It was like a bad dream. 
She almost doubted whether she might not be 
asleep. The landlady had never heard him go 
out, and until she had searched the whole house, 
would not believe he was not somewhere in it. 
Rather unwillingly, she allowed Molly to occupy 
his room for the night ; and Molly, that she 


DOING AND DREAMING. 269 

might start by the first train, stretched herself 
in her clothes on the miserable little horse- 
hair sofa. She could not sleep, and was not 
a little anxious about Walter’s travelling in 
such a condition ; but for all that, she could not 
help laughing more than once or twice to think 
how aunt Ann would be crowing over her : 
basely deserted, left standing in the yard in 
her Sunday clothes, it was to her care after 
all that Walter was given, not Molly’s ! But 
Molly could well enough afford to join in her 
aunt’s laugh : she had done her duty, and did 
not need to be told that we have nothing to 
do with consequences, only with what is right. 
So she waited patiently for the morning. 

But how was she to do when she got home ? 
Aunt Ann would have installed herself as nurse ! 
It would not matter much while Walter was 
really ill ; so long aunt Ann would be good to 
him ! but when he began to be himself again — 
for that time Molly must look out and be ready ! 
When she reached home, she was received at 


270 


HOME AGAIN. 


the door by her father who had been watching 

for her, and learned all he had to tell her. 

Aunt Ann spoke to her as if she had but 

the minute before left the room, vouchsafing 

not a single remark concerning Walter, and 
% 

yielding her a position of service as narrow 
as she could contrive to make it. Molly did 
everything she desired without complaint, fetch- 
ing and carrying for her as usual. She received 
no recognition from the half unconscious Walter. 

If it had not been that aunt Ann must, like 
other nurses, have rest, Molly’s ministering soul 
would have been sorely pinched and ham- 
pered ; but when her aunt retired, she could 
do her part for the patient’s peace. In a few 
days he had come to himself enough to know 
who were about him, and seemed to manifest 
a preference for Molly’s nursing. To aunt Ann 
this seemed very hard — and hard it would have 
been, but that, through all her kindness, Walter 
could not help foreseeing how she would treat him 
in the health to which she was doing her best to 


DOING AND DREAMING. 


271 


bring him back. He sorely dreaded the time 
when, strong enough to be tormented, but not 
able to lock his door against her, he would be at 
her mercy. But he cherished a hope that his 
father would interfere. If necessary he would 
appeal to him, and beg him to depose aunt Ann, 
and put sweet Molly in her stead ! 

One morning — Molly had been sitting up the 
night with the invalid — she found aunt Ann 
alone at the breakfast-table. 

“ His father is with him now,” said Molly. 
“ I think he is a little better ; he slept more 
qufetly.” 

“ He’ll do well enough ! ” grunted aunt Ann. 
“ There’s no fear of him ! he’s not of the sort to 
die early ! This is what comes of letting young 
people have their own way! My brother will 
be wiser now ! and so, I hope, will Walter ! It 
shall not be my fault if lie’s not made to under- 
stand ! Old or young wouldn’t listen to me ! 
Now perhaps, while they are smarting from the 
rod, it may be of use to speak ! ” 


2^2 


HOME AGAIN. 


“Aunt,” said Molly, with her heart in her 
throat, but determined, “ please do not say any- 
thing to him for a long time yet ; you might 
make him ill again ! You do not know how 
he hates being talked at ! ” 

“ Don’t you be afraid ! I won’t talk at him ! 
He shall be well talked to , and straight ! ” 

“ He won’t stand it any more, auntie ! He’s 
a man now, you know ! And when a mere boy, 
he used to complain that you were always find- 
ing fault with him ! ” 

“ Highty, tighty ! What next ! The gentle- 
man has the choice, has he, when to be found 
fault with, and when not ! ” 

“ I give you fair warning,” said Molly hur- 
riedly, “that I will do what I can to prevent 
you ! ” 

Aunt Ann was indignant. 

“You dare to tell me, in my own — ” — she 
was going to say house , but corrected herself — 
“ — in my own home, where you live on the 
charity of ” 


DOING AND DREAMING, 


273 


Molly interrupted her. 

“ I shall ask my father,” she said, “ whether 
he wishes me to have such words from you. 
If he does, you shall say what you please to me. 
But as to Walter, I will ask nobody. Till he is 
able to take care of himself, I shall not let you 
plague him. I will fight you first ! There now ! ” 

The flashing eyes and determined mouth of 
Molly, who had risen, and stood regarding her 
aunt in a flame of honest anger, cowed her. 
She shut her jaws close, and looked the picture 
of postponement. 

That instant came the voice of Mr. Colman : 

“ Molly ! Molly ! ” 

“Yes, Richard 1” answered Miss Hancock, 
rising. 

But Molly was out of the door, almost before 
her aunt was out of her chair. 

Walter had asked where she was, and wanted 
to see her. It was the first wish of any sort he 
had expressed ! 


274 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

DREAM-MOLLY. 

So far better as to be able to talk, Walter one 
day told Molly the strange dream, which, as he 
looked back, seemed to fill the whole time 
almost from his leaving his lodging to his 
recognition of his father by his bedside. 

It was a sweet day in the first of the spring. 
He lay with his head toward the window, and the 
sun was shining into the room, with the tearful 
radiance of sorrows overlived and winter gone, 
when Molly entered. She was at once whelmed 
in the sunlight, so that she could see nothing, 
while Walter could almost have counted her 
eye-lashes. 

“ Stand there, Molly,” he cried, “ — one mo- 
ment 1 I want to look at you l ” 


DREAM-MOLLY. 275 

“ It is not fair ! ” returned Molly. “ The sun 
is in my eyes ! I am as blind as a bat ! ” 

“ I won’t ask you, if you mind, Molly ! ” 
returned Walter. 

In these days he had grown very gentle. He 
seemed to dread the least appearance of 
exaction. 

“ I will stand where you like, and as long as 
you like, Walter ! Have you not consented to 
live a little longer with us ! Oh, Walter, you 
don’t know what it was like when the doctor 
looked grave ! ” 

Molly stood in the sun, and Walter looked 
at her till his eyes were wearied with the bright- 
ness she reflected, and his heart made strong by 
the better brightness she radiated. For Molly 
was the very type of a creature born of the sun 
and ripened by his light and heat — a glowing 
fruit of the tree of life amid its healing foliage, 
all splendour, and colour, and overflowing 
strength. Self-will is weakness ; the will to do 
right is strength ; Molly willed the right thing 


2 76 HOME AGAIN. 

and held to it. Hence it was that she was so 
gentle. She walked lightly over the carpet, 
because she could run up a hill like a hare. 
When she caught selfishness in her, she was 
down upon it with the knee and grasp of a 
giant. Strong is man or woman whose eternal 
life subjects the individual liking to the perfect 
will. Such man, such woman, is free man, free 
woman. 

Molly was in a daring dress of orange and 
red. Scarce a girl in London would have 
ventured to wear it ; few girls would not have 
looked vulgar in it ; yet Molly was right. Like 
a dark-cored sunflower, she caught and kept 
the sun. 

Having gazed at her in silence for a while, 
Walter said, 

“ Come and sit by me, Molly. I want to tell 
the dream I have been having.” 

She came at once, glad to get out of the sun. 
But she sat where he could still see her, and 
waited. 


DREAM-MOLLY. 


277 


“ I think I remember reaching the railway, 
Molly, but I remember nothing after that, until 
I thought I was in a coal-pit, with a great 
roaring everywhere about me. I was shut up 
for ever by an explosion, and the tumbling 
subterranean waters were coming nearer and 
nearer ! They never came, but they were 
always coming ! Suddenly some one took me 
by the arm, and pulled me out of the pit. Then 
I was on the hill above the pit, and had to get 
to the top of it. But it was in the teeth of a 
snow-storm ! My breath was very short, and I 
could hardly drag one foot up after the other. 
All at once there was an angel with wings by 
my side, and I knew it was Molly. I never 
wondered that she had wings. I only said to 
myself, ‘ How clever she must be to stow them 
away when she doesn’t want them ! ’ Up and 
up we toiled, and the way was very long. But 
when I got too tired, you stood before me, and I 
leaned against you, and you folded your wings 
about my head, and so I got breath to go on 


273 


HOME AGAIN. 


again. And I tried to say, 4 How can you be 
so kind to me ! I never was good to you ! * ” 

“ You dreamed quite wrong there, Walter ! ” 
interposed Molly. “You were always good to 
me — except, perhaps, when I asked you too 
many questions ! ” 

“ Your questions were too wise for me, Molly ! 
If I had been able to answer them, this trouble 
would never have come upon me. But I do 
wish I could tell you how delightful the dream 
was, for all the wind and the snow ! I re- 
member exactly how I felt, standing shadowed 
by your wings, and leaning against you ! ” 
Molly’s face flushed, and a hazy look came 
into her eyes, but she did not turn them away. 
He stopped, and lay brooding on his dream. 

“ But all at once,” he resumed, “ it went away 
in a chaos of coal-pits, and snow-storms, and 
eyes not like yours, Molly ! I was tossed about 
for ages in heat and cold, in thirst and loathing, 
with now one now another horrid draught held 
to my lips, thirst telling me to drink, and dis- 


DREAM-MOLLY. 


279 


gust making me dash it on the ground — only 
to be back at my lips the next moment. Once 
I was a king sitting upon a great tarnished 
throne, dusty and worm-eaten, in a lofty room 
of state, the doors standing wide, and the spiders 
weaving webs across them, for nobody ever 
came in, and no sound shook the moat-filled 
air : on that throne I had to sit to all eternity, 
because I had said I was a poet and was not ! 
I was a fellow that had stolen the poet-book of 
the universe, torn leaves from it, and pieced the 
words together so that only one could make 
sense of them — and she would not do it ! This 
vanished — and I was lying under a heap of dead 
on a battlefield. All above me had died doing 
their duty, and I lay at the bottom of the heap 
and could not die, because I had fought, not 
for the right, but for the glory of a soldier. I 
was full of shame, for I was not worthy to die ! 
I was not permitted to give my life for the great 
cause for which the rest were dead. But one of 
the dead woke, and turned, and clasped me ; 


280 


HOME AGAIN. 


and then I woke, and it was your arms about 
me, Molly ! and my head was leaning where it 
leant when your wings were about me ! ” 

By this time Molly was quietly weeping. 

“ I wish I had wings, Walter, to flap from 
morning to night for you ! ” she said, laughing 
through her tears. 

“ You are always flapping them, Molly ! only 
nobody can see them except in a dream. There 
are many true things that cannot be seen with 
the naked eye ! The eye must be clothed and 
in its right mind first ! ” 

“Your poetry is beginning to come, Walter ! 
I don’t think it ever did before ! ” said Molly. 

Walter gazed at her wonderingly : was little 
Molly going to turn out a sibyl? How grown 
she was ! What a peace and strength shone 
from her countenance ! She was woman, girl, 
and child, all in one ! What a fire of life 
there was in this lady with the brown hands — 
so different from the white, wax-doll ends to 
Lufa’s arms ! She was of the cold and ice, of 


DREAM-MOLLY. 


281 


the white death and lies ! Here was the warm, 
live, woman-truth ! He would never more love 
woman as he had ! Could that be a good thing 
which a creature like Lufa roused in him? 
Could that be true which had made him lie ? 
If his love had been of the truth, would it not 
have known that she was not a live thing ? 
True love would have known when it took in 
its arms a dead thing, a body without a soul, a 
material ghost ! 

Another time — it was a cold evening ; the 
wind howled about the house ; but the fire was 
burning bright, and Molly, having been reading 
to him, had stopped for a moment — Walter 
said, 

“ I could not have imagined I should ever feel 
at home as I do now ! I wonder why it is ! ” 

“ I think I could tell you ! ” said Molly. 

“ Tell me then.” 

“ It is because you are beginning to know 
your father ! ” 

“ Beginning to know my father, Moll ! ” 


282 


HOME AGAIN. 


“You never came right in sight of him till 
now. He has been the same always, but you 
did not — could not see him ! ” 

“ Why couldn’t I see him, wise woman ? ” 
said Walter. 

“Because you were never your father’s son 
till now,” answered Molly. “ Oh, Walter, if you 
had heard Jane tell what a cry he gave when he 
found his boy on the cold bench, in the gusty 
dark of the winter morning ! Half your father’s 
heart is with your mother, and the other half 
with you ! I did not know how a man could 
love till I saw his face as he stood over you once 
when he thought no one was near ! ” 

“ Did he find me on the stone bench ? ” 

“Yes, indeed! Oh, Walter, I have known 
God better, and loved him more, since I have 
seen how your father loves you ! ” 

Walter fell a thinking. He had indeed, since 
he came to himself, loved his father as he had 
never loved him before ; but he had not thought 
how he had been forgetting him. And herewith 


DREAM-MOLLY. 


283 


a gentle repentance began, which had a curing 
and healing effect on his spirit. Nor did the 
repentance leave him at his earthly father’s door, 
but led him on to his father in heaven. 

The next day he said, 

“I know another thing that makes me feel 
more at home : aunt Ann never scolds at me 
now. True, she seldom comes near me, and I 
cannot say I want her to come ! But just tell 
me, do you think she has been converted ? ” 
“Not that I know of. The angels will have 
a bad time of it before they bring her to her 
knees — her real knees, I mean, not her church- 
knees ! For aunt Ann to say she was wrong, 
would imply a change I am incapable of 
imagining. Yet it must come, you know, else 
how is she to enter the kingdom of heaven ? ” 

“ What then makes her so considerate ? ” 

“ It’s only that I’ve managed to make her 
afraid of me.” 


10 


284 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

WORK-A-DAY MOLLY. 

The days passed ; week after week went down 
the hill — or, is it not rather, up the hill? — and 
out of sight ; the moon kept on changelessly 
changing ; and at length Walter was well, though 
rather thin and white. 

Molly saw that he was beginning to brood. 
She saw also, as clearly as if he had opened his 
mind to her, what troubled him : it needed no 
witch to divine that ! he must work : what was 
his work to be ? 

Whatever he do, if he be not called to it, a 
man but takes it up “at his own hand, as the 
devil did sinning.” 

Molly was one of the wise women of the world 
— and thus : thoughts grew for her first out of 


WORK-A-DAY MOLLY* 285 

things, and not things out of thoughts. God’s 
things come out of his thoughts ; our realities 
are God’s thoughts made manifest in things ; 
and out of them our thoughts must come ; then 
the things that come out of our thoughts will be 
real. Neither our own fancies, nor the judgments 
of the world, must be the ground of our theories 
or behaviour. This, at least, was Molly’s work- 
ing theory of life. She saw plainly that her 
business, every day, hour, moment, was to order 
her way as he who had sent her into being 
would have her order her way ; doing God’s 
things, God’s thoughts would come to her ; 
God’s things were better than man’s thoughts ; 
man’s best thoughts the discovery of the thoughts 
hidden in God’s things ? Obeying him, perhaps 
a day would come in which God would think 
directly into the mind of his child, without 
the intervention of things ! * 

* It may interest some of my readers to be told that I 
had got thus far in preparation for this volume, when I 
took a book from the floor, shaken with hundreds beside 
from my shelves by an earthquake the same morning, 


286 


HOME AGAIN. 


For Molly had made the one rational, one 
practical discovery, that life is to be lived, not 
by helpless assent or aimless drifting, but by 
active co-operation with the Life that has said 
“ Live.” To her everything was part of a whole, 
which, with its parts, she was learning to know, 
was finding out, by obedience to what she 
already knew. There is nothing for develop- 
ing even the common intellect like obedience, 
that is, duty done. Those who obey are soon 
wiser than all their lessons ; while from those 
who do not, will be taken away even what 
knowledge they started with. 

Molly was not prepared to attempt convincing 
Walter, who was so much more learned and 
clever than she, that the things that rose in 
men’s minds, even in their best moods, were 
not necessarily a valuable commodity, but that 

and opening it — it was a life of Lavater which I had not 
known I possessed — found these words, written by him 
on a card, for a friend to read after his death : — “ Act 
according to thy faith in Christ, and thy faith will soon 
become sight.* 


WORK-A-DAY MOLLY. 287 

their character depended on the soil whence 
they sprang. She believed, however, that she 
had it in her power to make him doubt his 
judgment in regard to the work of other people, 
and that might lead him to doubt his judgment 
of himself, and the thoughts he made so 
much of. 

One lovely evening in July, they were sitting 
together in the twilight, after a burial of the 
sun that had left great heaps of golden rubbish 
on the sides of his grave, in which little cherubs 
were busy dyeing their wings. 

“ Walter,” said Molly, “ do you remember 
the little story — quite a little story, and not 
very clever — that I read when you were ill, 
called * Bootless Betty ’ ? ” 

“ I should think I do ! I thought it one of 
the prettiest stories I had ever read, or heard 
read. Its fearless directness, without the least 
affectation of boldness, enchanted me. How one 
— clearly a woman — whose grammar was nowise 
to be depended upon, should yet get so swiftly 


288 


HOME AGAIN. 


and unerringly at what she wanted to say, has 
remained ever since a worshipful wonder to 
me. But I have seen something like it before, 
probably by the same writer ! ” 

“You may have seen the same review of it 
I saw ; it was in your own paper.” 

“You don’t mean you take in The Field 
Battery ? ” 

“We did. Your father went for it himself, 
every week regularly. But we could not always 
be sure which things you had written ! ” 

Walter gave a sigh of distaste, but said 
nothing. The idea of that paper representing 
his mind to his father and Molly, was painful 
to him. 

“ I have it here : may I read it to you ? ” 

“Well — I don’t know! — if you like. I can’t 
say I care about reviews.” 

“Of course not! Nobody should. They are 
only thoughts about thoughts about things. 
— But I want you to hear this ! ” pleaded Molly, 
drawing the paper from her pocket. 


WORK-A-DAY MOLLY. 289 

The review was of the shortest — long enough, 
however, to express much humorous contempt 
for the kind of thing of which it said this was 
a specimen. It showed no suspicion of the 
presence in it of the things Walter had just 
said he saw there. But as Molly read, he 
stopped her. 

“ There is nothing like that in the story ! The 
statement is false ! ” he exclaimed. 

“Not a doubt of it!” responded Molly, and 
went on. 

But, arrested by a certain phrase, Walter 
presently stopped her again. 

“ Molly,” he said, seizing her hand, “ is it any 
wonder I cannot bear the thought of touching 
that kind of work again ? Have pity upon me, 
Molly! It was I, I myself, who wrote that 
review ! I had forgotten all about it ! I did 
not mean to lie, but I was not careful enough 
not to lie! I have been very unjust to 
some one ! ” 

“You could learn her name, and how to find 


HOME AGAIN. 


29O 

her, from the publisher of the little book ! ” 
suggested Molly. 

“ I will find her, and make a humble apology. 
The evil, alas ! is done ; but I could — and will 
write another notice quite different.” 

Molly burst into the merriest laugh. 

“ The apology is made, Walter, and the writer 
forgives you heartily ! Oh, what fun ! The 
story is mine ! You needn’t stare so — as if you 
thought I couldn’t do it ! Think of the bad 
grammar! It was not a strong point at Miss 
Talebury’s! Yes, Walter,” she continued, talk- 
ing like a child to her doll, “ it was little Molly’s 
first ! and her big brother cut it all up into 
weeny weeny pieces for her ! Poor Molly ! 
But then it was a great honour, you know 
— greater than ever she could have hoped 
for!” 

Walter stared bewildered, hardly trusting 
his ears. Molly an authoress ! — in a small way, 
it might be, but did God ever with anything 
begin it big ? Here was he, home again 


WORK-A-DAY MOLLY. 


291 


defeated ! — to find the little bird he had left 
in the nest beautifully successful ! 

The lords of creation have a curious way of 
patronizing the beings they profess to worship. 
Man was made a little lower than the angels ; 
he calls woman an angel, and then looks down 
upon her ! Certainly, however, he has done his 
best to make her worthy of his condescension ! 
But Walter had begun to learn humility, and 
no longer sought the chief place at the feast. 

“ Molly ! ” he said, in a low, wondering voice 
“ Yes? ” answered Molly. 

“ Forgive me, Molly. I am unworthy.” 

“ I forgive you with all my heart, and love 
you for thinking it worth while to ask me.” 

“ I am full of admiration of your story ! ” 

“ Why ? It was not difficult.” 

Walter took her little hand and kissed it as if 
she had been a princess. Molly blushed, but did 
not take her hand from him. Walter might do 
what he liked with her ugly little hand ! It was 
only to herself she called it ugly, however, not 


292 HOME AGAIN. 

to Walter ! Anyhow she was wrong ; her hand 
was a very pretty one. It was indeed a little 
spoiled with work, but it was gloved with 
honour! It were good for many a heart that 
its hands were so spoiled ! Human feet get a 
little broadened with walking ; human hands 
get a little roughened with labour ; but what 
matter ! There are others, after like pattern 
but better finished, making, and to be ready 
by the time these are worn out, for all who have 
not shirked work. 

Walter rose and went up the stair to his own 
room, a chamber in the roof, crowded with 
memories. There he sat down to think, and 
thinking led to something else. Molly sat still 
and cried ; for though it made her very glad to 
see him take it so humbly, it made her sad to 
give him pain. But not once did she wish she 
had not told him. 


( 293 ) 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 

After a while, as he did not appear, Molly 
went up to find him : she was anxious he 
should know how heartily she valued his real 
opinion. 

“ I have got a little poem here — if you can 
call it a poem — a few lines I wrote last Christ- 
mas : would you mind looking at it, and telling 
me if it is anything ? ” 

“ So, my bird of paradise, you sing too ? ” 
said Walter. 

“ Very little. A friend to whom I sent it, 
took it, without asking me, to one of the 
magazines for children, but they wouldn’t have 
it. Tell me if it is worth printing. Not that 
I want it printed — not a bit ! ” 


294 


HOME AGAIN 


“ I begin to think, Molly, that anything you 
write must be worth printing ! But I wonder 
you should ask one who has proved himself so 
incompetent to give a true opinion, that even 
what he has given he is unable to defend ! ” 

“ I shall always trust your opinion, Walter — 
only it must be an opinion : you gave a judgment 
then without having formed an opinion. Shall 
I read?” 

“Yes, please, Molly. I never used to like 
having poetry read to me, but you can read 
poetry ! ” 

“ This is easy to read ! ” said Molly. 

“ See the countless angels hover ! 

See the mother bending over ! 

See the shepherds, kings, and cow! 

What is baby thinking now ? 

Oh, to think what baby thinks 

Would be worth all holy inks! 

But he smiles such lovingness, 

That I will not fear to guess ! — 

‘ Father called ; you would not come ! 

‘ Here I am to take you home ! 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 


295 


4 For the father feels the dearth 
* Of his children round his hearth — 

‘Wants them round and on his knee — 

‘ That’s his throne for you and me ! * 

Something lovely like to this 
Surely lights that look of bliss ! 

Or if something else be there, 

Then ’tis something yet more fair ; 

For within the father’s breast 
Lies the whole world in its nest.’* 

She ceased. 

Walter said nothing. His heart was full. 
What verses were these beside Lufa’s fire- 
works ! 

“You don’t care for them!” said Molly, 
sadly, but with the sweetest smile. “ It’s not 
that I care so much about the poetry ; but I 
do love what I thought the baby might be 
thinking : it seems so true ! so fit to be true ! ” 

“ The poetry is lovely, anyhow ! ” said Walter. 
“ And one thing I am sure of— the father will 
not take me on his knee, if I go on as I have 
been doing! — You must let me see everything 


296 HOME AGAIN. 

you write, or have written, Molly ! Should you 
mind?” 

“ Surely not, Walter ! We used to read every- 
thing we thought might be yours ! ” 

“ Oh, don’t ! ” cried Walter. “ I can’t bear to 
think of the beastly business ! — I beg your 
pardon, Molly ; but I am ashamed of the thing. 
There was not one stroke of good in the whole 
affair ! ” 

“ I admit,” said Molly, “ the kind of thing is 
not real work, though it may well be hard 
enough ! But all writing about books and 
authors is not of that kind. A good book, like 
a true man, is well worth writing about by any 
one who understands it. That is very differ- 
ent from making it one’s business to sit in 
judgment on the work of others. The mental 
condition itself of habitual judgment is a false 
one. Such an attitude toward any book re- 
quiring thought, and worthy of thought, renders 
it impossible for the would-be judge to know 
what is in the book. If, on the other hand, the 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 


297 


book is worth little or nothing, it is not worth 
writing about, and yet has a perfect claim to fair 
play. If we feel differently at different times 
about a book we know, how am I to know the 
right mood for doing justice to a new book ?” 

" I am afraid the object is to write, not to 
judge righteous judgment ! ” 

“ One whose object is to write, and with whom 
judgment is the mere pretext for writing, is a 
parasite, and very pitiful, because, being a man, 
he lives as a flea lives. You see, Walter, by 
becoming a critic, you have made us critical — 
your father and me ! We have talked about 
these things ever since you took to the pro- 
fession ! ” 

“Trade, Molly ! ” said Walter, gruffly. 

“ A profession, at least, that is greater than its 
performance ! But it has been to me an educa- 
tion. We got as many as we were able of the 
books you took pains with, and sometimes could 
not help doubting whether you had seen the 
object of the writer. In one you dwelt scornfully 


298 HOME AGAIN. 

on the unscientific allusions, where the design of 
the book was perfectly served by those allusions, 
which were merely to illustrate what the author 
meant. Your social papers, too, were but 
criticism in another direction. We could not 
help fearing that your criticism would prove 
a quicksand, swallowing your faculty for original, 
individual work. — Then there was one horrid 
book you reviewed 1 ” 

“ Well, I did no harm there ! I made it out 
horrid enough, surely ! ” 

“ I think you did harm. I, for one, should 
never have heard of the book, and nobody 
down here would, I believe, if you had not 
written about it! You advertized it ! Let bad 
books lie as much unheard of as may be. 
There is no injustice in leaving them alone.” 

Walter was silent. 

“ I have no doubt,” he said at length, “ that 
you are out and out right, Molly ! Where my 
work has not been useless, it has been bad ! ” 

“ I do not believe it has been always useless,’' 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 299 

returned Molly. “ Do you know, for instance, 
what a difference there was between your 
notices of the first and second books of one 
author — a lady with an odd name — I forget it ? 
I have not seen the books, but I have the 
reviews. You must have helped her to im- 
prove ! ” 

Walter gave a groan. 

“ My sins are indeed finding me out ! ” he 
said. Then, after a pause — “ Molly,” he re- 
sumed, “you can’t help yourself — you’ve got to 
be my confessor ! I am going to tell you an 
ugly fact — an absolute dishonesty ! ” 

From beginning to end he told her the story 
of his relations with Lufa and her books ; how 
he had got the better of his conscience, per- 
suading himself that he thought that which he 
did not think, and that a book was largely 
worthy, where at best it was worthy but in a 
low degree; how he had suffered and been 
punished ; how he had loved her, and how his 
love came to a miserable and contemptible end. 


300 


HOME AGAIN. 


That it had indeed come to an end, Molly drew 
from the quiet way in which he spoke of it ; and 
his account of the letter he had written to Lufa, 
confirmed her conclusion. 

How delighted she was to be so thoroughly 
trusted by him ! 

“ I’m so glad, Walter ! ” she said. 

“ What are you glad of, Molly ? ” 

“ That you know one sort of girl, and are not 
so likely to take the next upon trust.” 

“ We must take some things on trust, Molly, 
else we should never have anything ! ” 

“ That is true, Walter ; but we needn’t with- 
out a question empty our pockets to the first 
beggar that comes ! When you were at home 
last, I wondered whether the girl could be worthy 
of your love. ” 

“ What girl ? ” asked Walter, surprised. 

“ Why, that girl, of course ! ” 

“ But I never said anything ! ” 

“ Twenty times a day.” 

“ What then made you doubt her worth ? ” 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 301 

“ That you cared less for your father.” 

“ I am a brute, Molly ! — Did he feel it very 
much ? ” 

“ He always spoke to God about it, not to me. 
He never finds it easy to talk to his fellow-man ; 
but I always know when he is talking to God ! 
— May I tell your father what you have just 
told me, Walter? — But of course not ! You will 
tell him yourself! ” 

“No, Molly! I would rather you should tell 
him. I want him to know, and would tell him 
myself, if you were not handy. Then, if he 
chooses, we can have a talk about it ! — But now, 
Molly, what am I to do ? ” 

“ You still feel as if you had a call to literature, 
Walter?” 

“I have no pleasure in any other kind of work.” 

“ Might not that be because you have not 
tried anything else ? ” 

“ I don’t know. I am drawn to nothing else.” 

“Well, it seems to me that a man who would 
like to make a saddle, must first have some pig- 


302 


HOME AGAIN. 


skin to make it of! — Have you any pigskin, 
Walter?” 

“ I see well enough what you mean ! ” 

“ A man must want long leisure for thought 
before he can have any material for his literary 
faculty to work with. You could write a his- 
tory, but could you write one now ? Even 
for a biography, you would have to read and 
study for months — perhaps years. As to the 
social questions you have been treating, men 
generally change their opinions about such 
things when they know a little more ; and who 
would utter his opinions, knowing he must by 
and by wish he had not uttered them ! ” 

“ No one ; but unhappily every one is cock- 
sure of his opinion till he changes it — and then 
he is as sure as before till he changes it again ! ” 
“Opinion is not sight, your father says,” 
answered Molly ; and again a little pause 
followed. 

“Well, but, Molly,” resumed Walter, “how is 
that precious thing, leisure for thought, to be 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 303 

come by? Write reviews I will not! Write 
a history, I cannot. Write a poem I might, 
but they wouldn’t buy copies enough of it to 
pay for the paper and printing. Write a novel I 
might, if I had time ; but how to live, not to say 
how to think, while I was writing it ? Perhaps 
I ought to be a tutor, or a schoolmaster ! ” 

“ Do you feel drawn to that, Walter ? ” 

“ I do not.” 

“ And you do feel drawn to write ? ” 

“ I dare not say I have thoughts which de- 
mand expression ; and yet somehow I want to 
write.” 

“And you say that some begin by writing 
what is of no value, but come to write things 
that are precious ? ” 

“ It is true.” 

“ Then perhaps you have served your apprent- 
iceship in worthless things, and the inclination 
to write comes now of precious things on their 
way, which you do not yet see or suspect, not to 
say know ! ” 


304 


HOME AGAIN. 


K But many men and women have the impulse 
to write, who never write anything of much 
worth I ” 

Molly thought a while. 

“ What if they yielded to the impulse before 
they ought? What if their eagerness to write 
when they ought to have been doing something 
else, destroyed the call in them ? That is 
perhaps the reason why there are so many dull 
preachers — that they begin to speak before they 
have anything to say ! ” 

“ Teaching would be favourable to learning ! ” 
“ It^would tire your brain, and give you too 
much to do with books ! You would learn 
chiefly from thoughts, and I stand up for things 
first. — And where would be your leisure ? ” 

“You have something in your mind, Molly! 
I will do whatever you would have me ! ” 

“ No, Walter,” exclaimed Molly, with a flash, 
“I will take no such promise! You will, I 
know, do what I or any one else may propose, 
if it appears to you right ! But don’t you think 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 305 

that, for the best work, a man ought to be 
independent of the work ? ” 

“ You would have your poet a rich man ! ” 
“Just the contrary, Walter ! A rich man is 
the most dependent of all — at least most rich 
men are. Take his riches, and what could 
himself do for himself? He depends on his 
money. No ; I would have the poet earn his 
bread by the sweat of his brow — with his hands 
feed his body, and with his heart and brain the 
hearts of his brothers and sisters. We have 
talked much about this, your father and I. 
That a man is not a gentleman who works with 
his hands, is the meanest, silliest article in the 
social creed of our country. He who would be a 
better gentleman than the Carpenter of Nazareth, 
is not worthy of him. He gave up his working 
only to do better work for his brothers and 
sisters, and then he let the men and women, 
but mostly, I suspect, the women, that loved 
him, support him ! Thousands upon thousands 
of young men think it more gentlemanly to be 


30 6 


HOME AGAIN. 


clerks than to be carpenters, but, if I were a 
man, I would rather make anything, than add 
up figures and copy stupid letters all day long ! 
If I had brothers, I would ten times rather see 
them masons, or carpenters, or bookbinders, or 
shoemakers, than have them doing what ought 
to be left for the weaker and more delicate ! ” 

“Which do you want me to be, Molly — a 
carpenter or a shoemaker ? ” 

“Neither, Walter — but a farmer: you don’t 
want to be a finer gentleman than your father ! 
Stay at home and help him, and grow strong. 
Plough and cart, and do the work of a labouring 
man. Nature will be your mate in her own 
workshop ! ” 

Molly was right. If Burns had but kept to 
his plough and his fields, to the birds and the 
beasts, to the storms and the sunshine ! He 
was a free man while he lived by his labour 
among his own people ! Ambition makes of 
gentlemen time-servers and paltry politicians ; 
of the ploughman-poet it made an exciseman ! 


THIS PICTURE AND THIS. 


30 / 


“ What will then become of the leisure you 
want me to have, Molly ? ” 

“Your father will see that you have it! In 
winter, which you say is the season for poetry, 
there will be plenty of time, and in summer 
there will be some. Not a stroke of your pen 
will have to go for a dinner or a pair of shoes ! 
Thoughts born of the heaven and the earth and 
the fountains of water, will spring up in your 
soul, and have time to ripen. If you find you 
are not wanted for an author, you will thank 
God you are not an author. What songs you 
would write then, Walter ! ” 

He sat motionless most of the time. Now 
and then he would lift his head as if to speak, 
but he did not speak ; and when Molly was 
silent, he rose and again went to his room. 
What passed there, I need not say. Walter was 
a true man in that he was ready to become 
truer: what better thing could be said of any 
unfinished man ! 


308 


HOME AGAIN. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

THE LAST, BUT NOT THE END. 

It was the second spring, and Molly and Walter 
sat again in the twilit garden. Walter had just 
come home from his day’s work ; he had been 
ploughing. He was a broad-shouldered, lean, 
powerful, handsome fellow, with a rather slow 
step, but soldierly carriage. His hands were 
brown and mighty, and took a little more 
washing than before. 

“My father does not seem quite himself!” he 
said to Molly. 

“ He has been a little depressed for a day or 
two,” she answered. 

“ There’s nothing wrong, is there, Molly ? * 

“No, nothing. It is only his spirits. They 


THE LAST, BUT NOT THE END. 309 

have never been good since your mother died. 
He declares himself the happiest man in the 
county, now you are at home with us.” 

Walter was up early the next morning, and 
again at his work. A new-born wind blew on 
his face, and sent the blood singing through his 
veins. If we could hear all finest sounds, we 
might, perhaps, gather not only the mood, but 
the character of a man, by listening to the 
music or the discord the river of his blood was 
making, as through countless channels it irri- 
gated lungs and brain : Walter’s that morning 
must have been weaving lovely harmonies ! It 
was a fresh spring wind, the breath of the world 
reviving from its winter-swoon. His father had 
managed to pay his debts ; his hopes were high, 
his imagination active ; his horses were pulling 
strong ; the plough was going free, turning over 
the furrow smooth and clean ; he was one of 
the powers of nature at work for the harvest of 
the year ; he was in obedient consent with the 
will that makes the world and all its summers 


310 HOME AGAIN. 

and winters! He was a thinking, choosing, 
willing part of the living whole, in vital fountain 
issuing from the heart of the Father of men ! 
Work lay all about him, and he was doing the 
work ! And Molly was at home, singing about 
hers ! At night, when the sun was set, and his 
day’s work done, he would go home to her 
and his father, to his room and his books and 
his writing ! 

But as he laboured, his thought this day was 
most of his father : he was trying to make 
something to cheer him. The eyes of the old 
man never lost their love, but when he forgot to 
smile, Molly looked grave, and Walter felt that 
a cloud was over the sun. They were a true 
family : when one member suffered, all the 
members suffered with it. 

So throughout the morning, as his horses 
pulled, and the earth opened, and the plough 
folded the furrow back, Walter thought, and 
made, and remembered : he had a gift for re- 
membering completions, and forgetting the chips 


THE LAST, BUT NOT THE END. 


311 

and rejected rubbish of the process. In the 
evening he carried home with him these 
verses : — 

How shall he sing who hath no song, 

He laugh who hath no mirth? 

Will strongest cannot wake a song ! 

It is no use to strive or long 
To sing with them that have a song, 

And mirthless laugh with mirth ! 

Though sad, he must confront the wrong, 

And for the right face any throng, 

Waiting, with patience sweet and strong, 

Until God’s glory fills the earth ; 

Then shall he sing who had no song, 

He laugh who had no mirth ! 

Yea, if like barren rock thou sit 
Upon a land of dearth, 

Round which but phantom waters flit, 

Of visionary birth — 

Yet be thou still, and wait, wait long ; 

There comes a sea to drown the wrong, 

His glory shall o’erwhelm the earth, 

And thou, no more a scathed rock, 

Shalt start alive with gladsome shock, 

Shalt a hand-clapping billow be, 

And shout with the eternal sea 1 


L- 


312 


HOME AGAIN. 


To righteousness and love belong 
The dance, the jubilance, the song ! 

For, lo, the right hath quelled the wrong, 

And truth hath stilled the lying tongue ! 

For, lo, the glad God fills the earth, 

And Love sits down by every hearth ! 

Now must thou sing because of song, 

Now laugh because of mirth ! 

Molly read the verses, and rose to run with 
them to her father. But Walter caught and 
held her. 

“ Remember, Molly,” he said, “I wrote it for 
my father ; it is not my own feeling at the 
moment For me, God has sent a wave of his 
glory over the earth ; it has come swelling out 
of the deep sea of his thought, has caught me 
up, and is making me joyful as the morning. 
That wave is my love for you, Molly — is you, 
my Molly ! ” 

She turned and kissed him, then ran to 
his father. He read, turned, and kissed 
Molly. 

In his heart he sang this song : 


THE LAST, BUT NOT THE END. 

“ Blessed art thou among women ! for 
hast given me a son of consolation ! ” 

And to Molly he said, 

“ Let us go to Walter 1 ” 


THE END. 



€l)c Jfligljt of tl)c J6>l)al»0ui 


BY 

GEORGE MACDONALD 

AUTHOR OF MALCOLM, ANNAL^OF A QUIET NEIGHBORHOOD, ETC. 



GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS, Limited 

NEW YORK: 9 LAFAYETTE PLACE 
LONDON AND MANCHESTER 


Copyright, 1891, 

By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 


All rights reserved. 


Electrotyped and Printed 
at the Appleton Press, U. S. A. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER PAGE 


I. Mrs. Day begins the 

STORY 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

5 

II. Miss Martha Moon . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

9 

III. My uncle . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

15 

IV. My uncle's room, and 

MY UNCLE 

IN 

IT . 

• 

• 

21 

V. My first secret 

• 

• 


• 

• 

• 

31 

VI. I LOSE MYSELF . 

4 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

44 

VII. The mirror 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

5i 

VIII. Thanatos and Zoe . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

4 

• 

58 

IX. The garden 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

70 

X. Once more a secret 

• 

• 

• 

4 

4 

• 

78 

XI. The mole burrows . 

* 

• 

• 

4 

• 

• 

84 

XII. A LETTER . 

• 

• 

• 

4 

• 

• 

89 

XIII. Old love and new . 

• 

• 

• 

4 

• 

• 

97 

XIV. Mother and uncle . 

• 

• 

• 

4 

• 

• 

105 

XV. The time between . 

* 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

116 

XVI. Fault and no fault 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

119 

XVII. The summons 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

126 

XVIII. John sees something 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

137 

XIX. John is taken ill . 

• 


• 

• 

• 

• 

141 

XX. A strange visit 

• 

• 

• 

0 

9 

• 

144 




4 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

XXI. A FOILED ATTEMPT 151 

XXII. John recalls and remembers .... 157 

XXIII. Letter and answer 166 

XXIV. Hand to hand 171 

XXV. A VERY STRANGE THING l8l 

XXVI. The evil draws nigher 190 

XXVII. An encounter 202 

XXVIII. Another vision 213 

XXIX. Mother and son 219 

XXX. Once more, and yet again 225 

XXXI. My uncle comes home 235 

XXXII. Twice two is one 243 

XXXIII. Half one is one 248 

XXXIV. The story of my twin uncles .... 254 

XXXV. Uncle Edmund’s appendix 285 

XXXVI. The end of the first volume .... 292 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


CHAPTER I. 

MRS. DAY BEGINS THE STORY. 

I am old, else, I think, I should not have the cour- 
age to tell the story I am going to tell. All those 
concerned in it about whose feelings I am careful, are 
gone where, thank God, there are no secrets ! If they 
know what I am doing, I know they do not mind. If 
they were alive to read as I record, they might per- 
haps now and again look a little paler and wish the 
leaf turned, but to see the things set down would not 
make them unhappy ; they do not love secrecy. Half 
the misery in the world comes from trying to look, 
instead of trying to be, what one is not. I would 
that not God only but all good men and women might 
see me through and through. They would not be 
pleased with everything they saw, but then neither am 
I, and I would have no coals of fire in my soul’s pock- 
ets ! But my very nature would shudder at the 
thought of letting one person that loved a secret see 


6 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


into it. Such a one never sees things as they are — 
would not indeed see what was there, but something 
shaped and colored after his own likeness. No one 
who loves and chooses a secret can be of the pure in 
heart that shall see God. 

Yet how shall I tell even who I am ? Which of us 
is other than a secret to all but God ! Which of us 
can tell, with poorest approximation, what he or she 
is! Not to touch the mystery of life — that one who is 
not myself has made me able to say /, how little can 
any of us tell about even those ancestors whose names 
we know, while yet the nature, and still more the 
character, of hundreds of them, have shared in deter- 
mining what I means every time one of us utters the 
word ! For myself, I remember neither father nor 
mother, nor one of their fathers or mothers : how lit- 
tle then can I say as to what I am ! But I will tell as 
much as most of my readers, if ever I have any, will 
care to know. 

I come of a long yeoman-line of the name of 
Whichcote. In Scotland the Whichcotes would have 
been called lairds ; in England they were not called 
squires. Repeatedly had younger sons of it risen to 
rank and honor, and in several generations would his 
property have entitled the head of the family to rank 
as a squire, but at the time when I began to be aware 
of existence, the family possessions had dwindled 


MRS. DAY BEGINS THE STORY. 


7 


to one large farm, on which I found myself. Natu- 
rally, while some of the family had risen, others had 
sunk in the social scale ; and of the latter was Miss 
Martha Moon, far more to my life than can appear in 
my story. I should imagine there are few families in 
England covering a larger range of social difference 
than ours. But I begin to think the chief difficulty in 
writing a book must be to keep out what does not be- 
long to it. 

I may mention, however, my conviction, that I 
owe many special delights to the gradual development 
of my race in certain special relations to the natural 
ways of the world. That I was myself brought up in 
such relations, appears not enough to account for the 
intensity of my pleasure in things belonging to sim- 
plest life — in everything of the open air, in animals of 
all kinds, in the economy of field and meadow and 
moor. I can no more understand my delight in the 
sweet breath of a cow, than I can explain the process 
by which, that day in the garden — but I must not 
forestall, and will say rather — than I can account for 
the tears which, now I am an old woman, fill my eyes 
just as they used when I was a child, at sight of the 
year’s first primrose. A harebell, much as I have al- 
ways loved harebells, never moved me that way ! 
Some will say the cause, whatever it be, lies in my na- 
ture, not in my ancestry ; that, anyhow, it must have 


8 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


come first to some one — and why not to me ? I an- 
swer, Everything lies in every one of us, but has to be 
brought to the surface. It grows a little in one, more 
in that one’s child, more in that child’s child, and so 
on and on — with curious breaks as of a river which 
every now and then takes to an underground course. 
One thing I am sure of — that, however any good thing 
came, I did not make it; I can only be glad and 
thankful that in me it came to the surface, to tell me 
how beautiful must he be who thought of it, and made 
it in me. Then surely one «is nearer, if not to God 
himself, yet to the things God loves, in the country 
than amid ugly houses — things that could not have 
been invented by God, though he made the man that 
made them. It is not the fashionable only that love 
the town and not the country ; the men and women 
who live in dirt and squalor — their counterparts in 
this and worse things far more than they think — are 
afraid of loneliness, and hate God’s lovely dark. 


CHAPTER II. 


MISS MARTHA MOON. 

Let me look back and see what first things I first 
remember ! 

All about my uncle first ; but I keep him to the 
last. Next, all about Rover, the dog — though for 
roving, I hardly remember him away from my side! 
Alas, he did not live to come into the story, but I 
must mention him here, for I shall not write another 
book, and, in the briefest summary of my childhood, 
to make no allusion to him would be disloyalty. I 
almost believe that at one period, had I been set to 
say who I was, I should have included Rover as an 
essential part of myself. His tail was my tail ; his 
legs were my legs ; his tongue was my tongue ! — so 
much more did I, as we gamboled together, seem 
conscious of his joy than of my own ! Surely, among 
other and greater mercies, I shall find him again ! 

The next person I see busy about the place, now 
here now there in the house, and seldom outside it, is 
Miss Martha Moon. The house is large, built at a 


IO 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


time when the family was one of consequence, and 
there was always much to be done in it. The largest 
room in it is now called the kitchen, but was doubtless 
called the hall when first it was built. This was Miss 
Martha Moon’s headquarters. 

She was my uncle’s second cousin, and as he al- 
ways called her Martha, so did I, without rebuke : 
every one else about the place called her Miss Martha. 

Of much greater worth and much more genuine 
refinement than tens of thousands the world calls 
ladies, she never claimed the distinction. Indeed she 
strongly objected to it. If you had said or implied 
she was a lady, she would have shrunk as from a cov- 
ert reflection on the quality of her work. Had she 
known certain of such as nowadays call themselves 
lady-helps, I could have understood her objection. I 
think, however, it came from a stern adherence to the 
factness — if I may coin the word — of things. She 
never called a lie a fib. 

When she was angry, she always held her tongue ; 
she feared being unfair. She had indeed a rare power 
of silence. To this day I do not know , but am never- 
theless sure, that, by an instinct of understanding, she 
saw into my uncle’s trouble, and descried, more or less 
plainly, the secret of it, while yet she never even al- 
luded to the existence of such a trouble. She had a 
regard for woman’s dignity as profound as silent. 


MISS MARTHA MOON. 


1 1 


She was not of those that prate or rave about their 
rights, forget their duties, and care only for what they 
count their victories. 

She declared herself dead against marriage. One 
day, while yet hardly more than a child, I said to her 
thoughtfully, 

“ I wonder why you hate gentlemen, Martha ! ” 

“ Hate ’em ! What on earth makes you say such a 
wicked thing, Orbie ? ” she answered. “ Hate ’em, the 
poor dears ! I love ’em ! What did you ever see to 
make you think I hated your uncle now ? ” 

“Oh! of course! uncle!” I returned; for my un- 
cle was all the world to me. “ Nobody could hate 
uncle ! ” 

“ She’d be a bad woman, anyhow, that did ! ” re- 
joined Martha. “ But did anybody ever hate the per- 
son that couldn’t do without her, Orbie ? ” 

My name — suggested by my uncle because my 
mother died at my birth — was a curious one; I be- 
lieve he made it himself. Belorba it was, and it means 
Fair Orphan. 

“ I don’t know, Martha,” I replied. 

“ Well, you watch and see ! ” she returned. “ Do 
you think I would stay here and work from morning 
to night if I hadn’t some reason for it ? — Oh, I like 
work ! ” she went on ; “ I don’t deny that. I should 
be miserable if I didn’t work. But I’m not bound 


12 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


to this sort of work. I have money of my own, and 
I’m no beggar for house-room. But rather than leave 
your uncle, poor man ! I would do the work of a 
plowman for him.” 

“ Then why don’t you marry him, Martha ? ” I 
said, with innocent impertinence. 

“ Marry him ! I wouldn’t marry him for ten 
thousand pounds, child ! ” 

“Why not, if you love him so much ? I’m sure he 
wouldn’t mind ! ” 

“ Marry him ! ” repeated Miss Martha, and stood 
looking at me as if here at last was a creature she 
could not understand ; “ marry the poor dear man, and 
make him miserable ! I could love any man better 
than that ! Just you open your eyes, my dear, and see 
what goes on about you. Do you see so many men 
made happy by their wives ? I don’t say it’s all the 
wives’ fault, poor things ! But the fact’s the same : 
there’s the poor husbands all the time trying hard to 
bear it ! What with the babies, and the headaches, 
and the rest of it, that’s what it comes to — the hus- 
bands are not happy ! No, no ! A woman can do bet- 
ter for a man than marry him ! ” 

“ But mayn’t it be the husband’s fault — sometimes, 
Martha?” 

“ It may ; but what better is it for that ? What 
better is the wife for knowing it, or how much happier 


MISS MARTHA MOON. 


13 


the husband for not knowing it ? As soon as you 
come to weighing who’s in fault, and counting how 
much, it’s all up with the marriage. There’s no more 
comfort in life for either of them ! Women are sent 
into the world to make men happy. I was sent to 
your uncle, and I’m trying to do my duty. It’s noth- 
ing to me what other women think ; I’m here to serve 
your uncle. What comes of me, I don’t care, so long 
as I do my work, and don’t keep him waiting that 
made me for it. You may think it a small thing to 
make a man happy ! I don’t. God thought him 
worth making, and he wouldn’t be if he was miser- 
able. I’ve seen one woman make ten men unhappy ! 
I know my calling, Orbie. Nothing would make me 
marry one of them, poor things ! ” 

“ But if they all said as you do, Martha ? ” 

“ No doubt the world would come to an end, but it 
would go out singing, not crying. I don’t see that 
that would matter. There would be enough to make 
each other happy in heaven, and the Lord could 
make more as they were wanted.” 

“ Uncle says it takes God a long time to make a 
man ! ” I ventured to remark. 

Miss Martha was silent for a moment. She did 
not see how my remark bore on the matter in hand, 
but she had such respect for anything my uncle said, 
that when she did not grasp it she held her peace. 


14 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Anyhow there’s no fear of it for the present ! ” 
she answered. “You heard the screed of banns last 
Sunday ! ” 

I thought you would have a better idea of Miss 
Martha Moon from hearing her talk, than from any 
talk about her. To hear one talk is better than to 
see one. But I would not have you think she often 
spoke at such length. She was in truth a woman of 
few words, never troubled or troubling with any 
verbal catarrh. Especially silent she was when any 
one she loved was in distress. I have seen her stand 
moveless for moments, with a look that was the in- 
carnation of essential motherhood — as if her eyes 
were swallowing up sorrow ; as if her soul was ready 
to be the sacrifice for sin. Then she would turn away 
with a droop of the eyelids that seemed to say she 
saw what it was, but saw also how little she could do 
for it. Oh the depth of the love-trouble in those eyes 
of hers ! 

Martha never set herself to teach me anything, but 
I could not know Martha without learning something 
of the genuine human heart. I gathered from her by 
unconscious assimilation. Possibly, a spiritual action 
analogous to exosmose and endosmose, takes place 
between certain souls. 


CHAPTER III. 


MY UNCLE. 

Now I must tell you what my uncle was like. 

The first thing that struck you about him would 
have been, how tall and thin he was. The next thing 
would have been, how he stooped ; and the next, how 
sad he looked. It scarcely seemed that Martha Moon 
had been able to do much for him. Yet doubtless she 
had done, and was doing, more than either he or she 
knew. He had rather a small head on the top of his 
long body ; and when he stood straight up, which was 
not very often, it seemed so far away, that some one 
said he took him for Zaccheus looking down from the 
sycamore. I never thought of analyzing his appear- 
ance, never thought of comparing him with any one 
else. To me he was the best and most beautiful of 
men — the first man in all the world. Nor did I 
change my mind about him ever — I only came to 
want another to think of him as I did. 

His features were in fine proportion, though per- 
haps too delicate. Perhaps they were a little too 


l6 THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 

small to be properly beautiful. When first I saw a 
likeness of the poet Shelley, I called out “ My uncle ! ” 
and immediately began to see differences. He wore 
a small but long mustache, brushed away from his 
mouth ; and over it his eyes looked large. They were 
of a clear gray, and very gentle. I know from the 
testimony of others, that I was right in imagining him 
a really learned man. That small head of his con- 
tained more and better than many a larger head of 
greater note. He was constantly reading — that is, 
when not thinking, or giving me the lessons which 
make me now thank him for half my conscious soul. 

Reading or writing or thinking, he made me al- 
ways welcome to share his room with him ; but he sel- 
dom took me out walking. He was by no means 
regular in his habits — regarded neither times nor sea- 
sons — went and came like a bird. His hour for going 
out was unknown to himself, was seldom two days 
together the same. He would rise up suddenly, even 
in the middle of a lesson — he always called it “a les- 
son together ” — and without a word walk from the 
room and the house. I had soon observed that in 
gloomy weather he went out often, in the sunshine 
seldom. 

The house had a large garden, of a very old-fash- 
ioned sort, such a place for the charm of both glory 
and gloom as I have never seen elsewhere. I have 


MY UNCLE. 


17 


had other eyes opened within me to deeper beauties 
than I saw in that garden then ; my remembrance of 
it is none the less of an enchanted ground. But my 
uncle never walked in it. When he walked it was al- 
ways out on the moor he went, and what time he 
would return no one ever knew. His meals were un- 
interesting to him — no concern to any one but Mar- 
tha, who never uttered a word of impatience, and sel- 
dom a word of anxiety. At whatever hour of the 
day he went, it was almost always night when he came 
home, often late night. In the house he much pre- 
ferred his own room to any other. 

This room, not so large as the kitchen-hall, but 
quite as long, seems to me, when I look back, my 
earliest surrounding. It was the center from which 
my roving fancies issued as from their source, and 
the end of their journey to which as to their home 
they returned. It was a curious place. Were you to 
see first the inside of the house and then the outside, 
you would find yourself at a loss to conjecture where 
within it could be situated such a room. It was not, 
however, contained in what, to a cursory glance, 
passed for the habitable house, and a stranger would 
not easily have found the entrance to it. 

Both its nature and situation were in keeping with 
certain peculiarities of my uncle’s mental being. He 
was given to curious inquiries. He would set out to 


1 8 the flight of the shadow. 

solve now one now another historical point as odd as 
uninteresting to any but a mind capable of starting 
such a question. To determine it, he would search 
book after book, as if it were a live thing, in whose 
memory must remain, darkly stored, thousands of 
facts, requiring only to be recollected ; among them 
might nestle the thing he sought, and he would dig 
for it as in a mine that went branching through the 
hardened dust of ages. I fancy he read any old book 
whatever of English history with the haunting sense 
that next moment he might come upon the trace of 
certain of his own ancestors of whom he specially de- 
sired to enlarge his knowledge. Whether he started 
any new thing in mathematics I can not tell, but he 
would sit absorbed, every day and all day long for 
weeks, over his slate, suddenly throw it down, walk 
out for the rest of the day, and leave his calculus, or 
whatever it was, for months. He read Shakespeare as 
with a microscope, propounding and answering the 
most curious little questions. It seemed to me some- 
times, I confess, that he missed a plain point from his 
eyes being so sharp that they looked through it 
without seeing it, having focused themselves beyond 
it. 

A specimen of the kind of question he would ask 
and answer himself, occurs to me as I write, for he 
put it to me once as we read together. 


MY UNCLE. 


19 


“ Why," he said, “ did Margaret, in Much ado about 
Nothing , try to persuade Hero to wear her other ra- 
bato ? ” 

And the answer was : 

“Because she feared her mistress would find out 
that she had been wearing it — namely, the night be- 
fore, when she personated her." 

And here I may put down a remark I heard him 
make in reference to a theory which itself must seem 
nothing less than idiotic to any one who knows Shake- 
speare as my uncle knew him. The remark was this 
— that whoever sought to enhance the fame of Lord 
St. Albans — he was careful to use the real title — by 
attributing to him the works of Shakespeare, must 
either be a man of weak intellect, of great ignorance, 
or of low moral perception ; for he cast on the mem- 
ory of a man already more to be pitied than any, a 
weight of obloquy such as it were hard to believe any 
one capable of deserving. A being with Shakespeare’s 
love of human nature, and Bacon’s insight into essen- 
tial truth, guilty of the moral and social atrocities 
into which his lordship’s eagerness after money for 
scientific research betrayed him, would be a monster 
as grotesque as abominable. 

I record the remark the rather that it shows my un- 
cle could look at things in a large way as well as hunt 
with a knife-edge. At the same time, devoutly as I 


20 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


honor him, I can not but count him intended for 
thinkings of larger scope than such as then seemed 
characteristic of him. I imagine his early history had 
affected his faculties, and influenced the mode of their 
working. How indeed could it have been otherwise ! 


CHAPTER IV. 


MY UNCLE’S ROOM, AND MY UNCLE IN IT. 

At right angles to the long, black and white 
house, stood a building behind it, of possibly earlier 
date, but uncertain intent. It had been used for 
many things before my uncle’s time — once as part 
of a small brewery. My uncle was positive that, 
whether built for the purpose or not, it had been 
used as a chapel, and that the house was originally 
the out-lying cell of some convent. The signs on 
which he founded this conclusion, I was never able 
to appreciate : to me, as containing my uncle’s study, 
the wonder-house of my childhood, it was far more 
interesting than any history could have made it. It 
had very thick walls, two low stories, and a high roof. 
Entering it from the court behind the house, every 
portion of it would seem to an ordinary beholder 
quite accounted for ; but it might have suggested 
itself to a more comprehending observer, that a con- 
siderable space must lie between the roof and the 
low ceiling of the first floor, which was taken up with 


22 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


the servants’ rooms. Of the ground floor, part was 
used as a dairy, part as a woodhouse, part for certain 
vegetables, while part stored the turf dug for fuel 
from the neighboring moor. 

Between this building and the house was a smaller 
and lower erection, a mere out-house. It also was 
strongly built, however, and the roof, in perfect con- 
dition, seemed newer than the walls : it had been 
raised and strengthened when used by my uncle to 
contain a passage leading from the house to the roof 
of the building just described, in which he was fash- 
ioning for himself the retreat which he rightly called 
his study, for few must be the rooms more con- 
tinuously thought and read in during one lifetime 
than this. 

I have now to tell how it was reached from the 
house. You could hardly have found the way to it, 
even had you set yourself seriously to the task, with- 
out having in you a good share of the constructive 
faculty. The whole was my uncle’s contrivance, but 
might well have been supposed to belong to the 
troubled times when a good hiding-place would have 
added to the value of any home. 

There was a large recess in the kitchen, of which 
the hearth, raised a foot or so above the flagged floor, 
had filled the whole — a huge chimney in fact, built out 
from the wall. At some later time an oblong space 


MY UNCLE’S ROOM, AND MY UNCLE IN IT. 23 

had been cut out of the hearth to a level with the 
floor, and in it an iron grate constructed for the more 
convenient burning of coal. Hence the remnant of 
the raised hearth looked like wide hobs to the grate. 
The recess as a chimney-corner was thereby spoiled, 
for coal makes a very different kind of smoke from 
the aromatic product of wood or peat. 

Right and left within the recess were two com- 
mon unpainted doors, with latches.- If you opened 
either, you found an ordinary shallow cupboard, that 
on the right fdled with shelves and crockery, that on 
the left with brooms and other household implements. 

But if, in the frame of the door to the left, you 
pressed what looked like the head of a large nail, not 
its door only but the whole cupboard turned inward 
on unseen hinges, and revealed an ascending stair, 
which was the approach to my uncle’s room. At the 
head of the stair you went through the wall of the 
house to the passage under the roof of the out-house, 
at the end of which a few more steps led up to the 
door of the study. By that door you entered the 
roof of the more ancient building. Lighted almost 
entirely from above, there was no indication outside 
of the existence of this floor, except one tiny window, 
with vaguely pointed arch, almost in the very top of 
the gable. Here lay my nest ; this was the bower of 
my bliss. 


24 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


Its walls rose but about three feet from the floor 
ere the slope of the roof began, so that there was a 
considerable portion of the room in which my tall 
uncle could not stand upright. There was width 
enough notwithstanding, in which four as tall as he 
might have walked abreast up and down a length of 
at least five and thirty feet. 

Not merely the low walls but the slopes of the 
roof were filled with books as high as the narrow level 
portion of the ceiling. On the slopes the bookshelves 
had of course to be peculiar. My uncle had con- 
trived, and partly himself made them, with the assist- 
ance of a carpenter he had known all his life. They 
were individually fixed to the rafters, each projecting 
over that beneath it. To get at the highest, he had to 
stand on a few steps ; to reach the lowest, he had to 
stoop at a right angle. The place was almost a tun- 
nel of books. 

By setting a chair on an ancient chest that stood 
against the gable, and a footstool on the chair, I 
could mount high enough to get into the deep em- 
brasure of the little window, whence alone to gain a 
glimpse of the lower world, while from the floor I 
could see heaven through six skylights, deep framed 
in books. As far back as I can remember, it was my 
care to see that the inside of their glass was always 
bright, so that sun and moon and stars might look in. 


MY UNCLE’S ROOM, AND MY UNCLE IN IT. 25 

The books were mostly in old and dingy bindings, 

but there were a few to attract the eyes of a child 

especially some annuals, in red silk, or embossed 
leather, or, most bewitching of all, in paper, pro- 
tected by a tight case of the same, from which, with 
the help of a ribbon, you drew out the precious 
little green volume, with its gilt edges and lovely 
engravings — one of which in particular I remember — 
a castle in the distance, a wood, a ghastly man at the 
head of a rearing horse, and a white, mistlike, fleet- 
ing ghost, the cause of the consternation. These 
books had a large share in the witchery of the 
chamber. 

At the end of the room, near the gable-window, 
but under one of the skylights, was a table of white 
deal, without cover, at which my uncle generally sat, 
sometimes writing, oftener leaning over a book. 
Occasionally, however, he would occupy a large old- 
fashioned easy-chair, under the slope of the roof, in 
the same end of the room, sitting silent, neither writ- 
ing nor reading, his eyes fixed straight before him, 
but plainly upon nothing. They looked as if sights 
were going out of them rather than coming in at 
them. When he sat thus I would sit gazing at him. 
Oh how I loved him — loved every line of his gentle, 
troubled countenance ! I do not remember the time 
when I did not know that his face was troubled. It 


26 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


gave the last finishing tenderness to my love for him. 
It was from no meddlesome curiosity that I sat 
watching him, from no longing to learn what he was 
thinking about, or what pictures were going and com- 
ing before the eyes of his mind, but from such a long- 
ing to comfort him as amounted to pain. I think it 
was the desire to be near him — in spirit, I mean, for 
I could be near him in the body any time except 
when he was out on one of his lonely walks or rides — 
that made me attend so closely to my studies. He 
taught me everything, and I yearned to please him, 
but without this other half-conscious yearning I do 
not believe I should ever have made the progress 
he praised. I took indeed a true delight in learn- 
ing, but I would not so often have shut the book I 
was enjoying to the full and taken up another, but 
for the sight or the thought of my uncle’s counte- 
nance. 

I think he never once sat down in the chair I have 
mentioned without sooner or later rising hurriedly, 
and going out on one of his solitary rambles. 

When we were having our lessons together, as he 
phrased it, we sat at the table side by side, and he 
taught me as if we were two children finding out to- 
gether what it all meant. Those lessons had, I think, 
the largest share in the charm of the place ; yet when, 
as not unfrequently, my uncle would, in the middle of 


MY UNCLE’S ROOM, AND MY UNCLE IN IT. 2 J 

one of them, rise abruptly and leave me without a 
word, to go, I knew, far away from the house, I ,was 
neither dismayed nor uneasy ; I had got used to the 
thing before I could wonder what it meant. I would 
just go back to the book I had been reading, *or to 
any other that attracted me ; he never required the 
preparation of any lessons. It was of no use to climb 
to the window in the hope of catching sight of him, 
for thence was nothing to be seen immediately below 
but the tops of high trees and a corner of the yard 
into which the cow-houses opened, and my uncle was 
never there. He neither understood nor cared about 
farming. His elder brother, my father, had been bred 
to carry on the yeoman-line of the family, and my 
uncle was trained to the medical profession. My 
father dying rather suddenly, my uncle, who was 
abroad at the time, and had not begun to practice, re- 
turned to take his place, but never paid practical at- 
tention to the farming any more than to his profes- 
sion. He gave the land in charge to a bailiff, and at 
once settled down, Martha told me, into what we now 
saw him. She seemed to imply that grief at my fa- 
ther’s death was the cause of his depression, but I 
soon came to the conclusion that it lasted too long to 
be so accounted for. Gradually I grew aware — so 
gradually that at length I seemed to have known it 
from the first — that the soul of my uncle was harassed 


28 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


with an undying trouble, that some worm lay among 
the very roots of his life. What change could ever 
dispel such a sadness as I often saw in that chair ! 
Now and then he would sit there for hours, an open 
book 'in his hand perhaps, at which he cast never a 
glance, all unaware of the eyes of the small maiden 
fixed upon him, with a whole world of sympathy be- 
hind them. I suspect, however, as I believe I have 
said, that Martha Moon, in her silence, had pierced 
the heart of the mystery, though she knew nothing. 

One practical lesson given me now and then in 
varying form by my uncle, I at length, one day, sud- 
denly and involuntarily associated with the darkness 
that haunted him. In substance it was this: “Never, 
my little one, hide anything from those that love you. 
Never let anything that makes itself a nest in your 
heart, grow into a secret, for then at once it will be- 
gin to eat a hole in it.” He would so often say the 
kind of thing, that I seemed to know when it was 
coming. But I had heard it as a thing of course, 
never realizing its truth, and listening to it only be- 
cause he whom I loved said it. 

I see with my mind’s eye the fine small head and 
large eyes so far above me, as we sit beside each other 
at the deal table. He looked down on me like a bird 
of prey. His hair — gray, Martha told me, before he 
was thirty — was tufted out a little, like ruffled feath- 


MY UNCLE’S ROOM, AND MY UNCLE IN IT. 29 

ers, on each side. But the eyes were not those of an 
eagle ; they were a dove’s eyes. 

“ A secret, little one, is a mole that burrows,” said 
my uncle. 

The moment of insight was come. A voice seemed 
suddenly to say within me, “ He has a secret ; it is 
biting his heart ! ” My affection, my devotion, my 
sacred concern for him, as suddenly swelled to twice 
their size. It was as if a God were in pain, and I 
could not help him. I had no desire to learn his se- 
cret ; I only yearned heart and soul to comfort him. 
Before long, I had a secret myself for half a day ; 
ever after, I shared so in the trouble of his secret, 
that I seemed myself to possess or rather to be pos- 
sessed by one — such a secret that I did not myself 
know it. 

But in truth I had a secret then ; for the moment I 
knew that he had a secret, his secret — the outward 
fact of its existence, I mean — was my secret. And be- 
sides this secret of his, I had then a secret of my own. 
For I knew that my uncle had a secret, and he did not 
know that I knew. Therewith came, of course, the 
question — Ought I to tell him ? At once, by the in- 
stinct of love, I saw that to tell him would put him in 
a great difficulty. He might wish me never to let any 
one else know of it, and how could he say so when he 
had been constantly warning me to let nothing grow 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


30 

to a secret in my heart ? As to telling Martha Moon, 
much as I loved her, much as I knew she loved my 
uncle, and sure as I was that anything concerning 
him was as sacred to her as to me, I dared not commit 
such a breach of confidence as even to think in her 
presence that my uncle had a secret. From that hour 
I had recurrent fits of a morbid terror at the very idea 
of a secret — as if a secret were in itself a treacherous, 
poisonous guest, that ate away the life of its host. 

But to return, my half-day secret came in this 


wise. 


CHAPTER V. 


MY FIRST SECRET. 

I WAS one morning with my uncle in his room. 
Lessons were over, and I was reading a marvelous 
story in one of my favorite annuals ; my uncle had so 
taught me from infancy the right handling of books, 
that he would have trusted me with the most valuable 
in his possession. I do not know how old I was, but 
that is no matter ; man or woman is aged according 
to the development of the conscience. Looking up, I 
saw him stooping over an open drawer in a cabinet 
behind the door. I sat on the great chest under the 
gable-window, and was away from him the whole 
length of the room. He had never told me not to 
look at him, had never seemed to object to the pres- 
ence of my eyes on anything he did, and as a matter 
of course I sat observing him, partly because I had 
never seen any portion of that cabinet open. He 
turned toward the sky-light near him, and held up 
between him and it a small something, of which I 
could just see that it was red, and shone in the light. 


32 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


Then he turned hurriedly, threw it in the drawer, and 
went straight out, leaving the drawer open. I knew I 
had lost his company for the day. 

The moment he was gone, the phantasm of the 
pretty thing he had been looking at so intently came 
back to me. Somehow I seemed to understand that I 
had no right to know what it was, seeing my uncle 
had not shown it me ! At the same time I had no 
law to guide me. He had never said I was not to 
look at this or that in the room. If he had, even if 
the cabinet had not been mentioned, I do not think I 
should have offended; but that does not make the 
fault less. For which is the more guilty — the man 
who knows there is a law against doing a certain 
thing and does it, or the man who feels an authority 
in the depth of his nature forbidding the thing, and 
yet does it ? Surely the latter is greatly the more 
guilty. 

I rose, and went to the cabinet. But when the 
contents of the drawer began to show themselves as I 
drew near, “ I closed my lids, and kept them close/’ 
until I had seated myself on the floor, with my back 
to the cabinet, and the drawer projecting over my 
head like the shelf of a bracket over its supporting 
figure. I could touch it with the top of ,my head by 
straightening my back. How long I sat there motion- 
less, I can not say, but it seems in retrospect at least 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


33 


a week, such a multitude of thinkings went through 
my mind. The logical discussion of a thing that has 
to be done, a thing awaiting action and not decision — 
the experiment, that is, whether the duty or the temp- 
tation has the more to say for itself, is one of the 
straight roads to* the pit. Similarly, there are multi- 
tudes who lose their lives pondering what they ought 
to believe, while something lies at their door waiting 
to be done, and rendering it impossible for him who 
makes it wait ever to know what to believe. Only a 
pure heart can understand, and a pure heart is one 
that sends out ready hands. I knew perfectly well 
what I ought to do — namely, to shut that drawer with 
the back of my head, then get up and do something, 
and forget the shining stone I had seen between my 
uncle’s finger and thumb ; yet there I sat debating 
whether I was not at liberty to do in my uncle’s room 
what he had not told me not to do. 

I will not weary my reader with any further de- 
scription of the evil path by which I arrived at the 
evil act. To myself it is pain even now to tell that I 
got on my feet, saw a blaze of shining things, banged- 
to the drawer, and knew that Eve had eaten the apple. 
The eyes of my consciousness were opened to the evil 
in me, through the evil done by me. Evil seemed 
now a part of myself, so that nevermore should I get 
rid of it. It may be easy for one regarding it from 


12 


34 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


afar, through the telescope only of a book, to exclaim, 
“Such a little thing!” but it was I who did it, and 
not another ! it was I, and only I, who could know 
what I had done, and it was not a little thing ! That 
peep into my uncle’s drawer lies in my soul the type 
of sin. Never have I done anything wrong with 
such a clear assurance that I was doing wrong, as 
when I did the thing I had taken most pains to reason 
out as right. 

Like one stunned by an electric shock, I had 
neither feeling nor care left for anything. I walked 
to the end of the long room, as far as I could go 
from the scene of my crime, and sat down on the great 
chest, with my coffin, the cabinet, facing me in the 
distance. The first thing, I think, that I grew con- 
scious of, was dreariness. There was nothing inter- 
esting anywhere. What should I do ? There was 
nothing to do, nothing to think about, not a book 
worth reading. Story was suddenly dried up at its 
fountain. Life was a plain without water-brooks. If 
the sky was not “ a foul and pestilent congregation of 
vapors,” it was nothing better than a canopy of gray 
and blue. By degrees my thought settled on what I 
had done, and in a moment I realized it as it was — a 
vile thing, and I had lost my life for it ! This is the 
nearest I can come to the expression of what I felt. 
I was simply in despair. I had done wrong, and the 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


35 

world had closed in upon me ; the sky had come down 
and was crushing me! The lid of my coffin was 
closed ! I should come no more out ! 

But deliverance came speedily — and in how lovely 
a way ! Into my thought, not into the room, came 
my uncle ! Present to my deepest consciousness, he 
stood tall, loving, beautiful, sad. I read no rebuke in 
his countenance, only sorrow that I had sinned, and 
sympathy with my suffering because of my sin. Then 
first I knew that I had wronged him in looking into 
his drawer; then first I saw it was his being that 
made the thing I had done an evil thing. If the 
drawer had been nobody’s, there would have been no 
wrong in looking into it ! And what made it so very 
bad was that my uncle was so good to me ! 

With the discovery came a rush of gladsome re- 
lief. Strange to say, with the clearer perception of 
the greatness of the wrong I had done, came the 
gladness of redemption. It was almost a pure joy to 
find that it was against my uncle, my own uncle, that 
I had sinned ! That joy was the first gleam through 
a darkness that had seemed settled on my soul for 
ever. But a brighter followed ; for thus spake the 
truth within me : “ The thing is in your uncle’s hands ; 
he is the lord of the wrong you have done; it is to 
him it makes you a debtor: — he loves you, and will 
forgive you. Of course he will ! He can not make 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


36 

undone what is done, but he will comfort you, and 
find some way of setting things right. There must 
be some way ! I can not be doomed to be a con- 
temptible child to all eternity ! It is so easy to go 
wrong, and so hard to get right ! He must help 
me ! ” 

I sat the rest of the day alone in that solitary 
room, away from Martha and Rover and everybody. 
I would that even now in my old age I waited for 
God as then I waited for my uncle ! If only he would 
come, that I might pour out the story of my fall, for 
I had sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgres- 
sion ! — only I was worse, for neither serpent nor wife 
had tempted me ! 

At tea-time Martha came to find me. I would not 
go with her. She would bring me my tea, she said. 
I would not have any tea. With a look like that she 
sometimes cast on my uncle, she left me. Dear 
Martha ! She had the lovely gift of leaving alone. 
That evening there was no tea in the house ; Martha 
did not have any. 

With the conceit peculiar to repentance and hu- 
miliation, I took a curious satisfaction in being hard 
on myself. I could have taken my meal tolerably 
well : wfith the new hope in my uncle as my savior, 
came comfort enough for the natural process of get- 
ting hungry, and desiring food; but with common, 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


3 7 


indeed vulgar, foolishness, my own righteousness in 
taking vengeance on my fault was a satisfaction to 
me. I did not then see the presumption of the sin- 
ner’s taking vengeance on her own fault, did not see 
that I had no right to do that. For how should a 
thing defiled punish ? With all my great joy in the 
discovery that the fault was against my uncle, I for- 
got that therefore I was in his jurisdiction, that he 
only had to deal with it, he alone could punish, as he 
alone could forgive it. 

It was the end of August, and the night stole 
swiftly upon the day. It began to grow very dusk, 
but I would not stir. I and the cabinet kept each 
other dismal company while the gloom deepened into 
night. Nor did the night part us, for I and the 
cabinet filled all the darkness. Had my uncle re- 
mained the whole night away, I believe I should have 
sat till he came. But happily, both for my mental 
suffering and my bodily endurance, he returned sooner 
than many a time. I heard the house-door open. I 
knew he would come to the study before going to his 
bedroom, and my heart gave a bound of awe-filled 
eagerness. I knew also that Martha never spoke to 
him when he returned from one of his late rambles, 
and that he would not know I was there : long before 
she died Martha knew how grateful he was for her 
delicate consideration. Martha Moon was not one of 


38 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


this world’s ladies; but there is a country where the 
social question is not, “Is she a lady?” but “How 
much of a woman is she ? ” Martha’s name must, I 
think, stand well up in the book of life. 

My uncle, then, approached his room without 
knowing there was a live kernel to the dark that 
filled it. I hearkened to every nearer step as he came 
up the stair, along the corridor, and up the short final 
ascent to the door of the study. I had crept from 
my place to the middle of the room, and, without a 
thought of consequences, stood waiting the arrival 
through the dark, of my deliverer from the dark. I 
did not know that many a man who would face a 
battery calmly, will spring a yard aside if a yelping 
cur dart at him. 

My uncle opened the door, and closed it behind 
him. His lamp and matches stood ready on his table : 
it was my part to see they were there. With a sigh, 
which seemed to seek me in the darkness and find me, 
he came forward through it. I caught him round the 
legs, and clung to him. He gave a great gasp and 
a smothered cry, staggered, and nearly fell. “ My 
God ! ” he murmured. 

“Uncle! uncle!” I cried, in greater terror than 
he; “it’s only Orbie! It’s only your little one! ” 

“Oh! it’s only my little one, is it?” he rejoined, 
at once recovering his equanimity, and not for a 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


39 

moment losing the temper so ready, like a nervous 
cat, to spring from most of us when startled. 

He caught me up in his arms, and held me to his 
heart. I could feel it beat against my little person. 

“Uncle! uncle!” I cried again. “Don’t! Don’t!” 

“Did I hurt you, my little one?” he said, and re- 
laxing his embrace, held me more gently, but did not 
set me down. 

“ No, no ! ” I answered. “But I’ve got a secret, 
and you mustn’t kiss me till it is gone. I wish there 
was a swine to send it into ! ” 

“ Give it to me, little one. I will treat it better 
than a swine would.” 

“ But it mustn’t be treated, uncle ! It might come 
again ! ” 

“ There is no fear of that, my child ! As soon as 
a secret is told, it is dead. It is a secret no longer.” 

“Will it be dead, uncle?” I returned. “ — But 
it will be there, all the same, when it is dead — an 
ugly thing. It will only put off its cloak and show 
itself ! ” 

“ All secrets are not ugly things when their cloaks 
are off. The cloak may be the ugly thing, and noth- 
ing else.” 

He stood in the dark, holding me in his arms. 
But the clouds had cleared off a little, and though 
there was no moon, I could see the dim blue of the 


40 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


sky-lights, and a little shine from the gray of his 
hair. 

“ But mine is an ugly thing,” I said, “ and I hate 
it. Please let me put it out of my mouth. Perhaps 
then it will go dead.” 

“ Out with it, little one.” 

“ Put me down, please,” I returned. 

He walked to the old chest under the gable-win- 
dow, seated himself on it, and set me down beside 
him. I slipped from the chest, and knelt on the 
floor at his feet, a little way in front of him. I did 
not touch him, and all was again quite dark about us. 

I told him my story from beginning to end, along 
with a great part of my meditations while hesitating 
to do the deed. I felt very choky, but forced my way 
through, talking with a throat that did not seem my 
own, and sending out a voice I seemed never to have 
heard before. The moment I ceased, a sound like a 
sob came out of the darkness. Was it possible my 
big uncle was crying ? Then indeed there was no 
hope for me ! He was horrified at -my wickedness, 
and very sorry to have to give me up ! I howled like 
a wild beast. 

“ Please, uncle, will you kill me?” I cried, through 
a riot of sobs that came from me like potatoes from a 
sack. 

“Yes, yes, I will kill you, my darling!” he an- 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


41 


swered — “ this way ! this way ! ” and stretching out 
his arms he found me in the dark, drew me to him, 
and covered my face with kisses. 

“ Now,” he resumed, “ I’ve killed you alive again, 
and the ugly secret is dead, and will never come to 
life any more. And I think, besides, we have killed 
the hen that lays the egg-secrets ! ” 

He rose with me in his arms, set me down on the 
chest, lighted his lamp, and carried it to the cabinet. 
Then he returned, and taking me by the hand, led me 
to it, opened wide the drawer of offense, lifted me, 
and held me so that I could see well into it. The 
light flashed in a hundred glories of color from a 
multitude of cut but unset stones that lay loose in it. 
I soon learned that most of them were of small money- 
value, but their beauty was none the less entrancing. 
There were stones of price among them, however, and 
these were the first he taught me, because they were 
the most beautiful. My fault had opened a new source 
of delight : my stone-lesson was now one of the great 
pleasures of the week. In after years I saw in it the 
richness of God not content with setting right what 
is wrong, but making from it a gain : he will not 
have his children the worse for the wrong they have 
done ! We shall lose nothing by it : he is our 
father ! For the hurting sand-grain, he gives his 
oyster a pearl. 


42 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“There,” said my uncle, “you may look at them 
as often as you please; only mind you put every one 
back as soon as you have satisfied your eyes with it. 
You must not put one in your pocket, or carry it 
about in your hand.” 

Then he set me down, saying : 

“Now you must go to bed, and dream about the 
pretty things. I will tell you a lot of stories about 
them afterward.” 

We had a way of calling any kind of statement a 
story. 

I never cared to ask how it was that, seeing all the 
same I had done the wrong thing, the whole weight 
of it was gone from me. So utterly was it gone, that 
I did not even inquire whether I ought so to let it pass 
from me. It was nowhere. In the fire of my uncle’s 
love to me and mine to him, the thing vanished. It 
was annihilated. Should I not be a creature unworthy 
of life, if, now in my old age, I, who had such an un- 
cle in my childhood, did not with my very life believe 
in God ! 

I have wondered whether, if my father had lived 
to bring me up instead of my uncle, I should have 
been very different; but the useless speculation has 
only driven me to believe that the relations on the 
surface of life are but the symbols of far deeper ties, 
which may exist without those correspondent external 


MY FIRST SECRET. 


43 


ones. At the same time, now that, being old, I natu- 
rally think of the coming change, I feel that, when I 
see my father, I shall have a different feeling for him 
just because he is my father, although my uncle did 
all the fatherly toward me. But we need not trouble 
ourselves about our hearts, and all their varying hues 
and shades of feeling. Truth is at the root of all ex- 
istence, therefore everything must come right if only 
we are obedient to the truth ; and right is the deepest 
satisfaction of every creature as well as of God. I 
wait in confidence. If things be not as we think, they 
will both arouse and satisfy a better think , making us 
glad they are not as we expected. 


CHAPTER VI. 


I LOSE MYSELF. 

I have one incident more to relate ere my narra- 
tive begins to flow from a quite clear memory. 

I was by no means a small bookworm, neither 
spent all my time in the enchanted ground of my un- 
cle’s study. It is true I loved the house, and often 
felt like a burrowing animal that would rather not 
leave its hole ; but occasionally even at such times 
would suddenly wake the passion for the open air : I 
must get into it or die ! I was well known in the 
farmyard, not to the men only, but to the animals 
also. In the absence of human playfellows, they did 
much to keep me from selfishness. But far beyond it 
I took no unfrequent flight — always alone. Neither 
Martha nor my uncle ever seemed to think I needed 
looking after; and I am not aware that I should have 
gained anything by it. I speak for myself ; I have 
no theories about the bringing up of children. I 
went where and when I pleased, as little challenged as 
my uncle himself. Like him, I took now and then a 


I LOSE MYSELF. 


45 


long ramble over the moor, fearing nothing, and 
knowing nothing to fear. I went sometimes where it 
seemed as if human foot could never have trod before, 
so wild and waste was the prospect, so unknown it 
somehow looked. The house was built on the more 
sloping side of a high hollow just within the moor, 
which stretched wide away from the very edge of the 
farm. If you climbed the slope, following a certain 
rough country road, at the top of it you saw on the 
one side the farm, in all the colors and shades of its 
outspread, well-tilled fields; on the other side, the 
heath. If you went another way, through the garden, 
through the belt of shrubs and pines that encircled it, 
and through the wilderness behind that, you were at 
once upon the heath. If then you went as far as the 
highest point in sight, wading through the heather, 
among the rocks and great stones which in childhood 
I never doubted grew also, you saw before you noth- 
ing but a wide, wild level, whose horizon was here and 
there broken by low hills. But the seeming level was 
far from flat or smooth, as I found on the day of the 
adventure I am about to relate. I wonder I had never 
lost myself before. I suppose then first my legs were 
able to wander beyond the ground with' which my 
eyes were familiar. 

It had rained all the morning and afternoon. 
When our last lesson was over, my uncle went out; 


46 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


and I betook myself to the barn, where I amused my- 
self in the straw. By this time Rover must have gone 
back to his Maker, for I remember as with me a large, 
respectable dog of the old-fashioned mastiff type, who 
endured me with a patience that amounted almost to 
friendliness, but never followed me about. When I 
grew hungry I went into the house to have my after- 
noon-meal. It was called tea, but I knew nothing 
about tea, while in milk I was a connoisseur. I. could 
tell perfectly to which of the cows I was indebted for 
the milk I happened at any time to be drinking ; Miss 
Martha never allowed the milks of the different cows 
to be mingled. 

Just as my meal was over, the sun shone with 
sudden brilliance into my very eyes. The storm was 
breaking up, and vanishing in the west. I threw 
down my spoon and ran, hatless as usual, from the 
house. The sun was on the edge of the hollow ; I 
made straight for him. The bracken was so wet that 
my legs almost seemed walking through a brook, and 
my body through a thick rain. In a moment I was 
sopping; but to be wet was of no consequence to me. 
Not for many years was I able to believe that damp 
could hurt. 

When I reached the top, the sun was yet some dis- 
tance above the horizon, and I had gone a good way 
toward him before he went down. As he sank he sent 


I LOSE MYSELF. 


47 


up a wind, which blew a sense of coming dark. The 
wind of the sunset brings me, ever since, a foreboding 
of tears: it seems to say — ‘‘Your day is done; the 
hour of your darkness is at hand.” It grew cold, and 
a feeling of threat filled the air. All about the grave 
of the buried sun, the clouds were angry with dusky 
yellow and splashes of gold. They lowered tumulous 
and menacing, Then, lo ! they had lost courage; 
their bulk melted off in fierce vapor, gold and gray, 
and the sharp outcry of their shape was gone. As I 
recall the airy scene, that horizon looks like the void 
between a cataclysm and the moving afresh of the 
spirit of God upon the face of the waters. I went on, 
and on, I do not know why. Something enticed me, 
or I was plunged in some meditation, then absorbing, 
now forgotten, not necessarily worthless. I am jeal- 
ous of moods that can be forgotten, but such may 
leave traces in the character. I wandered on. What 
ups and downs there were ! how uneven was the sur- 
face of the moor! The feet learned what the eyes 
had not seen. 

All at once I woke to the fact that mountains 
hemmed me in. They looked mountains, though they 
were but hills. What had become of home ? where was 
it ? The light lingering in the west might surely have 
shown me the direction of it, but I remember no west — 
nothing but a deep hollow and dark hills. I was lost ! 


48 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


I was not exactly frightened at first. I knew no 
cause of dread. I had never seen a tramp even ; I 
had no sense of the inimical. I knew nothing of the 
danger from cold and exposure. But awe of the fad- 
ing light and coming darkness awoke in me. I be- 
gan to be frightened, and fear is like other live 
things : once started, it grows. Then first I thought 
with dismay, which became terror, of the slimy bogs 
and the deep pools in them. But just as my heart was 
dying within me, I looked to the hills — with no hope 
that from them would come my aid — and there, on the 
edge of the sky, lifted against it, in a dip between two 
of the hills, was the form of a lady on horseback. I 
could see the skirt of her habit flying out against the 
clouds as she rode. Had she been a few feet lower, so 
as to come between me and the side of the hill instead 
of the sky, I should not have seen her ; neither should 
I if she had been a few hundred yards farther off. I 
shrieked at the thought that she did not see me, and I 
could not make her hear me. She started, turned, 
seemed to look whence the cry could have come, but 
kept on her way. Then I shrieked in earnest, and be- 
gan to run wildly toward her. I think she saw me — 
that my quicker change of place detached my shape 
sufficiently to make it discernible. She pulled up, and 
sat like a statue waiting me. I kept on calling as I 
ran, to assure her I was doing my utmost, for I feared 


I LOSE MYSELF. 


49 


she might grow impatient and leave me. But at last 
it was slowly indeed I staggered up to her, spent. My 
foot caught, and as I fell I clasped the leg of her 
horse ; I had no fear of animals more than of human 
beings. He was startled, and rearing drew his leg 
from my arms. But he took care not to come down 
on me. I rose to my feet, and stood panting. 

What the lady said, or what I answered, I can not 
recall. The next thing I remember is stumbling along 
by her side, for she made her horse walk that I might 
keep up with her. She talked a little, but I do not re- 
member what she said. It is all a dream now, a far- 
off one. It must have been like a dream at the time, 
I was so exhausted. I remember a voice descending 
now and then, as if from the clouds — a cold musical 
voice, with something in it that made me not want to 
hear it. I remember her saying that we were near her 
house, and would soon be there. I think she had 
found out from me where I lived. 

All -the time I never saw her face ; it was too dark. 
I do not think she once spoke kindly to me. She said 
I had no business to be out alone ; she wondered at 
my father and mother. I think I was too tired to tell 
her I had no father or mother. When I did speak, she 
indicated neither by sound nor movement that she 
heard or heeded what I said. She sat up above me in 
the dark, unpleasant, and all but unseen — a riddle 


5 o THE flight of the shadow. 

which the troubled child stumbling along by her 
horse’s side did not want solved. Had there been 
anything to call light, I should have run away from 
her. Vague doubts of witches and ogresses crossed 
mv mind, but I said to myself the stories about them 
were not true, and kept on as best I could. 

Before we reached the house we had left the 
heath, and were moving along lanes. The horse 
seemed to walk with more confidence, and it was 
harder for me to keep up with him. I was so tired 
that I could not feel my legs. I stumbled often, and 
once the horse trod on my foot. I fell ; he went on ; 
I had to run limping after him. At last we stopped. 
I could see nothing. The lady gave a musical cry. 
A voice and footsteps made answer ; and presently 
came the sound of a gate on its hinges. A long dark 
piece of road followed. I knew we were among trees, 
for I heard the wind in them over our heads. Then I 
saw lights in windows, and presently we stopped at 
the door of a great house. I remember nothing more 
of that night. 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE MIRROR. 

I woke the next morning in a strange bed, and for 
a long time could not think how I came to be there. 
A maid appeared, and told me it was time to get up. 
Greatly to my dislike, she would insist on dressing me. 
My clothes looked very miserable, I remember, in con- 
sequence of what they had gone through the night be- 
fore. She was kind to me, and asked a great many 
questions, but paid no heed to my answers — a treat- 
ment to which I had not been used ; I think she must 
have been the lady’s maid. When I was ready, she 
took me to the housekeeper’s room, where I had 
bread and milk for breakfast. Several servants, men 
and women, came and went, and I thought they all 
looked at me strangely. I concluded they had no 
little girls in that house. Assuredly there was small 
favor for children in it. In some houses the child is 
as a stranger ; in others he rules : neither such house 
is in the kingdom of heaven. I must have looked a 
forlorn creature as I sat, or perched rather, on the old 


52 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


horsehair-sofa in that dingy room. Nobody said more 
than a word or so to me. I wondered what was going 
to be done with me, but I had long been able to wait 
for what would come. At length, after, as it seemed, 
hours of weary waiting, during which my heart grew 
sick with longing after my uncle, I was, without a word 
of explanation, led through long passages into a room 
which appeared enormous. There I was again left a 
long while — this time alone. It was all white and 
gold, and had its walls nearly covered with great mir- 
rors from floor to ceiling, which, while it was indeed 
of great size, was the cause of its looking so im- 
measurably large. But it was some time before I dis- 
covered this, for I was not accustomed to mirrors. 
Except the small one on my little dressing-table, and 
one still less on Martha’s, I had scarcely seen a mir- 
ror, and was not prepared for those sheets of glass in 
narrow gold frames. 

I went about looking at one thing and another, but 
handling nothing; my late secret had cured me of 
that. Weary at last, I dropped upon a low chair, and 
would probably have soon fallen asleep, had not the 
door opened and some one come in. I could not see 
the door without turning, and was too tired and 
sleepy to move. I sat still, staring, hardly conscious, 
into the mirror in front of me. All at once I descried^ 
in it my uncle — but only to see him grow white as 


THE MIRROR. 


53 


death, and turn away, reeling as if he would fall. The 
sight so bewildered me that, instead of rushing to em- 
brace him, I sat frozen. He clapped his hands to his 
eyes, steadied himself, stood for a moment rigid, then 
came straight toward me. But, to my added astonish- 
ment, he gave me no greeting, or showed any sign 
of joy at having found me. Never before had he seen 
me for the first time any day, without giving me a 
kiss; never before, it seemed to me, had he spoken to 
me without a smile : I had been lost and was found, 
and he was not glad ! The strange reception fell on 
me like a numbing spell. I had nothing to say, no 
impulse to move, no part in the present world. He 
caught me up in his arms, hid his face upon me, 
knocked his shoulder heavily against the door-post as 
he went from the room, walked straight through the 
hall, and out of the house. I think no one saw us as 
we went ; I am sure neither of us saw any one. With 
long strides he walked down the avenue, never turn- 
ing his head. Not until we were on the moor, out of 
sight of the house, did he stop. Then he set me 
down ; and then first we discovered that he had left 
his hat behind. For all his carrying of me, and going 
so fast — and I must have been rather heavy — his face 
had no color in it. 

“ Sh'all I run and get it, uncle ? ” I said, as I 
saw him raise his hand to his head and find no hat 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


54 

there to be taken off. “ I should be back in a 
minute ! ” 

It was the first word spoken between us. 

“ No, my little one,” he answered, wiping his fore- 
head : his voice sounded far away, like that of one 
speaking in a dream : “ I can’t let you out of my 
sight. I’ve been wandering the moor all night look- 
ing for you ! ” 

With that he caught me up again, and pressing his 
face to mine, walked with me thus for a long quarter 
of a mile, I should think. Oh how safe I felt ! — and 
how happy ! — happy beyond smiling ! I loved him be- 
fore, but I never "knew before what it was to lose him 
and find him again. 

- “Tell me,” he said at length. 

I told him all, and he did not speak a word until 
my tale was finished. 

“ Were you very frightened,” he then asked, 
“ when you found you had lost your way, and darkness 
was coming ? ” 

“ I was frightened, or I would not have gone to 
the lady. But I wish I had stayed on the moor for you 
to find me. I knew you would soon be out looking 
for me. Until she came I comforted myself with 
thinking that perhaps even then you were on the 
moor, and I might see you any moment.” 

“ What else did you think of?” 


THE MIRROR. 


55 

“ I thought that God was out on the moor, and if 
you were not there, he would keep me company.” 

“Ah!” said my uncle, as if thinking to himself; 
“ she but needs him the more when I am with her ! ” 

“Yes, of course!” I answered; “I need him then 
for you as well as for myself.” 

“ That is very true, my child !— Shall I tell you one 
thing I thought of while looking for you ? ” 

“ Please, uncle.” 

“I thought how Jesus’ father and mother must 
have felt when they were looking for him.” 

“ And they needn’t have been so unhappy if they 
had thought who he was — need they ? ” 

“ Certainly not. And I needn’t have been so un- 
happy if I had thought who you were. But I was ter- 
ribly frightened, and there I was wrong.” 

“ Who am I, uncle ? ” 

“ Another little one of the same father as he.” 

“Why were you frightened, uncle?” 

“ I was afraid of your being frightened.” 

“ I hardly had time to be frightened before the 
lady came.” 

“Yes; you see I needn’t have been so unhappy! ” 

My uncle always treated me as if I could under- 
stand him perfectly. This came, I see now, from the 
essential childlikeness of his nature, and from no edm 
cational theory. 


56 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 

“ Sometimes,” he went on, “ I look all around me 
to see if Jesus is out anywhere, but I have never seen 
him yet ! ” 

“ We shall see him one day, sha’n’t we?” I said, 
craning round to look into his eyes, which were my 
earthly paradise. Nor are they a whit less dear to 
me, nay, they are dearer, that he has been in God’s 
somewhere, that is, the heavenly paradise, for many a 
year. 

“ I think so,” he answered, with a sigh that seemed 
to swell like a sea-wave against me, as I sat on his 
arm; “ — I hope so. I live but for that — and for one 
thing more.” 

There are some, I fancy, who would blame him for 
not being sure, and bring text after text to prove that 
he ought to have been sure. But oh those text-peo- 
ple ! They look to me, not like the clay-sparrows that 
Jesus made fly, but like bird-skins in a glass-case, 
stuffed with texts. The doubt of a man like my uncle 
must be a far better thing than their assurance ! 

“ Would you have been frightened if you had met 
him on the moor last night, little one?” he asked 
after a pause. 

“ Oh, no, uncle ! ” I returned. “ I should have 
thought it was you till I came nearer, and then I 
should have known who it was ! He wouldn’t like a 
big girl like me to be frightened at him — would he ? ” 


THE MIRROR. 


57 


“ Indeed not ! ” answered my uncle fervently ; but 
again his words brought with them a great sigh, and 
he said no more. 

When we reached home, he gave me up to Martha, 
and went out again — nor returned before I was in bed. 
But he came to my room, and waked me with a kiss, 
which sent me faster asleep than before. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 

I think it must have been soon after this that my 
uncle bought himself a horse. 1 know something of 
horses now — that is, if much riding and much love 
suffice to give a knowledge of them — and the horse 
which was a glory and a wonder to me then, is a glory 
and a wonder to me still. He was large, big-boned, 
and powerful, with less beauty but more grandeur 
than a thoroughbred, and full of a fiery gentleness. 
He was the very horse for Sir Philip Sidney. 

One day, after he had had him for several months, 
and had let no one saddle him but himself, therefore 
knew him perfectly, and knew that the horse knew 
his master, I happened to be in the yard as he 
mounted. The moment he was in the saddle he bent 
down to me, and held out his hand. 

“ Come with me, little one,” he said. 

Almost ere I knew, I was in the saddle before him. 
I grasped his hand, instinctively caught with my foot 
at his, and was astride the pommel. I will not say I 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 


59 


sat very comfortably, but the memory of that day’s 
delight will never leave me — not “ through all the 
secular to be.” There must be a God to the world 
that could give any such delight as fell then to the 
share of one little girl ! I think my uncle must soon 
after have got another saddle, for I have no recollec- 
tion of any more discomfort ; I remember only the de- 
light of the motion of the horse under me. 

For, after this, I rode with him often, and he 
taught me to ride as surely not many have been 
taught. When he saw me so at home in my seat as 
to require no support, he made me change my posi- 
tion, and go behind him. There I sat sideways on a 
cloth, like a lady of old time on a pillion. When I had 
got used to this, my uncle made me stand on the 
horse’s broad back, holding on by his shoulders ; and 
it was wonderful how soon, and how unconsciously, I 
accommodated myself to every motion of the strength 
that bore me, learning to keep my place by pure bal- 
ance like a rope-dancer. I had soon quite forgotten 
to hold by my uncle, and without the least support 
rode as comfortably, and with as much confidence, as 
any rider in a circus, though with a far less easy pace 
under me. When my uncle found me capable of this, 
he was much pleased, though a little nervous at times. 

Able now to ride his big horse any way, he brought 
me one afternoon the loveliest of Shetland ponies, not 


6o 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


very small. With the ordinary human distrust in 
good, I could hardly believe she was meant for me. 
She was a dappled gray — like the twilight of a morn- 
ing after rain, my uncle said. He called her Zoe, 
which means Life. His own horse he called Thanatos, 
which means Death. Such as understood it, thought 
it a terrible name to give a horse. For most people 
are so afraid of Death that they regard his very name 
with awe. 

My uncle had a riding-habit made for me, and 
after a week found I could give him no more trouble 
with my horsewomanship. At once I was at home on 
my new friend’s back, with vistas of delight innumera- 
ble opening around me, and from that day my uncle 
seldom rode without me. When he went wandering, 
it was almost always on foot, and then, as before, 
he was always alone. The idea of offering to accom- 
pany him on such an occasion had never occurred to 
me. 

But one stormy autumn afternoon — most of my 
memories seem of the autumn — my uncle looked 
worse than usual when he went out, and I felt, I think 
for the first time, a vague uneasiness about him. Per- 
haps I had been thinking of him more ; perhaps I had 
begun to wonder what the secret could be that made 
him so often seem unhappy. Anyhow this evening 
the desire awoke to be with him in his trouble what- 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 


6 1 


ever it was. There was no curiosity in the feeling, I 
think, only the desire to serve him as I had never 
served him yet. I had been, as long as I could re- 
member, always at his beck or lightest call; now I 
wanted to come when needed without being called. 
Was it impossible a girl should do anything for a man 
in his trouble ? He, a great man, had helped a little 
girl out of the deepest despair ; could the little girl do 
nothing for the great man ? That the big people 
should do everything, did not seem fair ! He had told 
me once that the world was held together by what 
every one could do that the others could not do : 
there must be something I could do that he could not 
do ! 

The rain was coming down on the roof like the 
steady tramp of distant squadrons. I was in the 
study, therefore near the tiles, and that was how the 
rain always sounded upon them. Tramp, tramp, 
tramp, came the whole army of things, riding, riding, 
to befall my uncle and me. Tramp, tramp, came the 
troops of the future, to take the citadel of the pres- 
ent ! I was not afraid of them, neither sought to im- 
agine myself afraid ! I had no picture in my mind of 
any evil that could assail me. A little grove of black 
poplars under the gable-window kept swaying their 
expostulations and moaning their entreaties. The 
great rushing blasts of the wind through their rooted 


62 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


resistance, made the music of the band that accom- 
panied the march of the unknown. I sat and listened, 
with the vague conviction that something was being 
done somewhere. It could not be that only the wind 
and the trees and the rain were all in that wailing and 
marching ! The Powers of life and death must some- 
where be at work ! Then rose before me the face 
of my uncle, as he walked from the room, haloed 
in a sorrowful stillness. If only I could be with 
him ! If only I knew where to seek him ! Wishing, 
wishing, I sat and listened to the rain and the 
wind. 

Suddenly I found myself on my feet, making for 
the door. I would not have ventured alone upon the 
moor in such a night, but I should have Zoe with me, 
who knew all the ways of it — had doubtless been used 
to bogs in her own country, and her mother before 
her! Like a small elephant, she would put out her 
little foot, and tap, and sound, to see if the surface 
would bear her — if the questionable spot was what it 
looked to her mistress, or what she herself doubted it. 
When she had once made up her mind in the nega- 
tive, no foolish attempt of mine could overpersuade 
her — could make her trust our weight on it a hair’s- 
breadth. In a bog the greenest spots are the most 
dangerous, and Zoe knew it : the matted roots might 
be afloat on a fathomless depth of water. Backed by 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 63 

my uncle, she soon taught me to be as much afraid of 
those green spots as she was herself. I had learned 
to trust her thoroughly. 

I took my way to the stable, with a hug and a kiss 
to Martha as I passed her in the kitchen. I got the 
cowboy to saddle Zoe, fearing I might not persuade 
one of the big men on such a night, and 1 was not 
quite able myself to tighten the girths properly. She 
had not been out all day, and, when I mounted, she 
danced at the prospect of a gallop. 

I took with me the little lantern I went about the 
place with when there was no moon, and, with this 
alight in my hand, we darted off at a tight-reined 
gallop into the wet blowing night. What I was going 
for I did not know, beyond being with my uncle. So 
far was I from any fear, that, but for my shadowy 
uneasiness about him, I should have been filled full of 
the wild joy of battle with the elements. The first 
part of the way I had to cling to the saddle : not 
otherwise could I keep my seat against the wind, 
which blew so fiercely on me sideways, that it threat- 
ened to blow me out of it. 

I had not gone far before the saddle began to turn 
round with me; I was slipping to the ground. I 
pulled up, dismounted, undid the girths with difficulty, 
set the saddle straight, then pulled at every strap 
with all my might. It was to no purpose : I could not 


6 4 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


get another hole out of one of them. I mounted and 
set off again ; but the moment a stronger blast came, 
the saddle began to turn. Then I thought of some- 
thing to try : dismounting once more, I got up on the 
off side. The wind now pushed me on to the saddle, 
freeing it from my leverage, while I had, besides, the 
use of my legs against the wind, so that we got on 
bravely, my Zoe and I. But, alas ! my lantern was 
out, and it was impossible to light it again, so that I 
had now no arrow to shoot at random for my uncle’s 
eye. Before long we reached a tolerable cart-track, 
which led across the waste to a village, and the wind 
being now behind us, I resumed the more comfortable 
seat in the saddle. 

We were going at a good speed, and had ridden, as 
I judged, about three miles, when there came a great 
flash of lightning — not like any flash I had ever seen 
before. It was neither the reflection of lightning be- 
low the horizon, nor the sudden zigzagged blade, the 
very idea of force without weight ; it was the burst of 
a ball-headed torrent of fire from a dark cloud, like 
water sudden from a mountain’s heart, which went 
rushing down a rugged channel, as if the cloud were 
indeed a mountain, and the fire one of its cataracts. 
Its endurance was momentary, but its moments might 
have been counted, for it lasted appreciably longer 
than an ordinary flash, revealing to my eyes what re- 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 


65 

mains on my mind clear as the picture of some neigh- 
boring tree on the skin of one slain by lightning. The 
torrent tumbled down the cloud and vanished, but left 
with me the vision of a man, plainly my uncle, a few 
hundred yards from me, on a gigantic gray horse, 
which reared high with fright. But for its size, I 
could have testified before a magistrate that I had 
not only seen that horse in the stable as my pony was 
being saddled, but had stroked and kissed him on the 
nose. I conceived at once that his apparent size was 
an illusion caused by the suddenness and keenness of 
the light, and that my uncle had come home before I 
had well reached the moor, and had ridden out after 
me. With a wild cry of delight, I turned at once to 
leave the road and join him. But the thunder that 
moment burst with a terrific bellow and swallowed my 
cry. The same instant, however, came through it 
from the other side the voice of my uncle only a few 
yards away. 

“Stay, little one,” he shouted; “ stay where you 
are. I will be with you in a moment.” 

I obeyed, as ever and always without a thought I 
obeyed the slightest word of my uncle : Zoe and I 
stood as if never yet parted from chaos and the dark, 
for Zoe too loved his voice. The wind rose suddenly 
from a lull to a great roar, emptying a huge cloudful 
of rain upon us, so that I heard no sound of my uncle’s 


13 


66 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


approach ; but presently out of the dark an arm was 
around me, and my head was lying on my uncle’s 
bosom. Then the dark and the rain seemed the 
natural elements for love and confidence. 

“ But, uncle,” I murmured, full of wonder which 
had had no time to take shape, “ how is it ? ” 

He answered in a whisper that seemed to dread 
the ear of the wind, lest it should hear him — 

“ You saw, did you ? ” 

“ I saw you upon Death away there in the middle 
of the lightning. I was going to you. I don’t know 
what to think.” 

My uncle and I often called the horse by his Eng- 
lish name. 

“ Neither do I,” he returned, with a strange half- 
voice, as if he were choking. “ It must have been — 
I don’t know what. There is a deep bog away just 
there. It must be a lake by now ! ” 

“Yes, uncle; I might have remembered! but how 
was I to think of that when I saw you there — on dear 
old Death too ! He’s the last of horses to get into a 
bog: he knows his own weight too well ! ” 

“ But why did you come out on such a night ? 
What possessed you, little one — in such a storm ? I 
begin to be afraid what next you may do.” 

“ I never do anything — now — that I think you 
would mind me doing,” I answered. “ But if you will 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 

write out a little book of mays and maynots, I will learn 
it by heart.” 

“ No, no,” he returned ; “ we are not going back 
to the tables of the law! You have a better law 
written in your heart, my child; I will trust to that. — 
But tell me why you came out on such a night — and 
as dark as pitch.” 

“ Just because it was such a night, uncle, and you* 
were out in it,” I answered. “ Ain’t I your own little 
girl? I hope you ain’t sorry I came, uncle! I am 
glad; and I shouldn’t like ever to be glad at what 
made you sorry.” 

“ What are you glad of ? ” 

“ That I came — because I’ve found you. I came 
to look for you.” 

“ Why did you come to-night more than any other 
night ? ” 

“ Because I wanted so much to see you. I thought 
I might be of use to you.” 

“ You are always of use to me ; but why did you 
think of it just to-night?” 

“ I don’t know. — I am older than I was last night,” 
I replied. 

He seemed to understand me, and asked me no 
more questions. 

All the time, we had been standing still in the 
storm. He took Zoe’s head and turned it toward 


68 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


home. The dear creature set out with slow, leisurely 
step, heedless apparently of storm and stable. She 
knew who was by her side, and he must set the 
pace ! 

As we went my uncle seemed lost in thought — and 
no wonder ! for how could the sight we had seen be 
accounted for ? Or what might it indicate ? 

Many were the strange tales I had read, and my 
conviction was that the vision belonged to the inex- 
plicable. It grew upon me that I had seen my uncle’s 
double. That he should see his own double would 
not in itself have much surprised me — or, indeed, that 
I should see it ; but I had never read of another per- 
son seeing a double at the same time with the person 
doubled. During the next few days I sought hard 
for some possible explanation of what had occurred, 
but could find nothing parallel to it within the scope 
of my knowledge. I tried fata morgana, mirage , par- 
helion, and whatever I had learned of recognized illu- 
sion, but in vain sought satisfaction, or anything point- 
ing in the direction of satisfaction. I was compelled 
to leave the thing alone. My uncle kept silence about 
it, but seemed to brood more than usual. I think he 
too was convinced that it must have another ex- 
planation than present science would afford him. 
Once I ventured to ask if he had come to any conclu- 
sion ; with a sad smile, he answered, 


THANATOS AND ZOE. 


69 

“ I am waiting, little one. There is much we have 
to wait for. Where would be the good of having your 
mind made up wrong ? It only stands in the way of 
getting it made up right ! ” 

By degrees the thing went into the distance, and I 
ceased even speculating upon it. But one little fact 
I may mention ere I leave it — that, just as I was 
ing a state of quiet mental prorogation, I suddenly 
remembered that, the moment after the flash, my Zoe, 
startled as she was, gave out a low whinny ; I remem- 
bered the quiver of it under me ; she too must have 
seen her master’s double ! 


CHAPTER IX. 


THE GARDEN. 

I remember nothing more to disturb the even flow 
of my life till I was nearly seventeen. Many pleasant 
things had come and gone ; many pleasant things kept 
coming and going. I had studied tolerably well — at 
least my uncle showed himself pleased with the progress 
I had made and was making. I know even yet a good 
deal more than would be required for one of these 
modern degrees feminine. I had besides read more of 
the older literature of my country than any one I have 
met except my uncle. I had also this advantage over 
most students, that my knowledge was gained without 
the slightest prick of the spur of emulation — purely in 
following the same delight in myself that shone radi- 
ant in the eyes of my uncle as he read with me. I 
had this advantage also over many, that, perhaps from 
impression of the higher mind, I saw and learned a 
thing not merely as a fact whose glory lay in the mys- 
tery of its undeveloped harmonics, but as the har- 
binger of an unknown advent. For as long as I can 


THE GARDEN. 


7 1 


remember, my heart was given to expectation, was 
tuned to long waiting. I constantly felt — felt without 
thinking — that something was coming. I feel it now. 
Were I young I dared not say so. How could I, com- 
passed about with so great a cloud of witnesses to the 
commonplace ! Do I not see their superior smile, as, 
with voices sweetly acidulous, they quote in reply — 

Love is well on the way ; 

He’ll be here to-day, 

Or, at latest, the end of the week ; 

Too soon you will find him, 

And the sorrow behind him 
You will not go out to seek ! 

Would they not tell me that such expectation was but 
the shadow of the cloud called love, hanging no big- 
ger than a man’s hand on the far horizon, but fraught 
with storm for mind and soul, which, when it with- 
drew, would carry with it the glow and the glory and 
the hope of life ! being at best but the mirage of an 
unattainable paradise, therefore direst of deceptions ! 
Little do such suspect that their own behavior has 
withered their faith, and their unbelief dried up their 
life. They can now no more believe in what they 
once felt, than a cloud can believe in the rainbow it 
once bore on its bosom. But I am old, therefore dare 
to say that I expect more and better and higher and 
lovelier things than I have ever had. I am not going 
home to God to say — “ Father, I have imagined more 


7 2 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


beautiful things than thou art able to make true ! They 
were so good that thou thyself art either not good 
enough to will them, or not strong enough to make 
them. Thou couldst but make thy creature dream of 
them, because thou canst but dream of them thyself ! ” 
Nay, nay ! In the faith of him to whom the Father 
shows all things he does, I expect lovelier gifts than I 
ever have been, ever shall be, able to dream of asleep, 
or imagine awake. 

I was now approaching the verge of womanhood. 
What lay beyond it I could ill descry, though surely a 
vague power of undeveloped prophecy dwells in every 
created thing — even in the bird ere he chips his shell. 

Should I dare, or could I endure, to write of what 
lies now to my hand, if I did not believe that not our 
worst but our best moments, not our low but our lofty 
moods, not our times logical and scientific but our 
times instinctive and imaginative, are those in which 
we perceive the truth ! In them we behold it with a 
beholding which is one with believing. And, 

Though nothing can bring back the hour 

Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower, 

could not Wordsworth, and can not we, call up the 
vision of that hour ? and has not its memory almost, 
or even altogether, the potency of its presence ? Is 
not the very thought of any certain flower enough to 
make me believe in that flower — believe it to mean all 


THE GARDEN. 


73 

it ever seemed to mean ? That these eyes may never 
more rest upon it with the old delight, means little, 
and matters nothing. I have other eyes, and shall 
have yet others.. If I thought, as so many have de- 
graded themselves to think, that the glory of things 
in the morning of love was a glamour cast upon the 
world, no outshine of indwelling radiance, should I 
care to breathe one day more the air of this or of 
any world? Nay, nay, but there dwells in every- 
thing the Father hath made, the fire of the burning 
bush, as at home in his Son dwelt the glory that, set 
free, broke out from him on the mount of his trans- 
figuration. The happy-making vision of things that 
floods the gaze of the youth, when first he lives in the 
marvel of loving and being loved by a woman, is the 
true vision — and the more likely to be the true one, 
that, when he gives way to selfishness, he loses faith 
in the vision, and sinks back into the commonplace 
unfaith of the beggarly world — a disappointed, sneer- 
ing worshiper of power and money — with this rem- 
nant of the light yet in him, that he grumbles at the 
gloom its departure has left behind. He confesses by 
his soreness that the illusion ought to have been true ; 
he seldom confesses that he loved himself more than 
the woman, and so lost her. He lays the blame on 
God, on the woman, on the soullessness of the uni- 
verse — anywhere but on the one being in which he is 


74 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


interested enough to be sure it exists — his own pre- 
cious, greedy, vulgar self. Would I dare to write of 
love, if I did not believe it a true, that is, an eternal 
thing ! 

It was a summer of exceptional splendor in which 
my eyes were opened to “ the glory of the sum of 
things.” It was not so hot of the sun as summers I 
have known, but there were so many gentle and lov- 
ing winds about, with never point or knife-edge in 
them, that it seemed all the housework of the universe 
was being done by ladies Then the way the odors 
went and came on those sweet winds ! and the way 
the twilight fell asleep into the dark ! and the way 
the sun rushed up in the morning, as if he cried, like a 
boy, “ Here I am ! The Father has sent me ! Isn’t it 
jolly ! ” I saw more sunrises that year than any year 
before or since. And the grass was so thick and soft ! 
There must be grass in heaven ! And the roses, both 
wild and tame, that grew together in the wilderness ! 
— I think you would like to hear about the wilder- 
ness. 

When I grew to notice, and think, and put things 
together, I began to wonder how the wilderness came 
there. I could understand that the solemn garden, 
with its great yew-hedges and alleys, and its oddly 
cut box-trees, was a survival of the stately old gar- 
dens haunted by ruffs and farthingales ; but the wil- 


THE GARDEN. 


75 


derness looked so much younger that I was perplexed 
with it, especially as I saw nothing like it anywhere 
else. I asked my uncle about it, and he explained 
that it was indeed after an old fashion, but that he 
had himself made the wilderness, mostly with his own 
hands, when he was young. This surprised me, for I 
had never seen him touch a spade, and hardly ever 
saw him in the garden : when I did, I always felt as if 
something was going to happen. He said he had in 
it tried to copy the wilderness laid out by Lord St. 
Alban’s in his essays. I found the volume, and soon 
came upon the essay, On Gardens. The passage con- 
cerning the wilderness gave me, and still gives me, 
so much delight, that I will transplant it like a rose- 
bush into this wilderness of mine, hoping it will give 
like pleasure to my reader. 

“ For the heath, which was the third part of our 
plot, I wish it to be framed, as much as may be, to a 
naturall wildnesse. Trees I would have none in it; 
but some thickets, made onely of sweetbriar, and 
honnysuckle, and some wild vine amongst ; and the 
ground set with violets, strawberries, and primeroses. 
For these are sweete, and prosper in the shade. And 
these to be in the heath, here and there not in any or- 
der. I like also little heapes, in the nature of mole- 
hils (such as are in wilde heaths) to be set, some with 
wilde thyme ; some with pincks ; some with german- 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


76 

der, that gives a good flower to the eye ; some with 
periwinckle; some with violets; some with strawber- 
ries; some with couslips; some with daisies; some 
with red roses; some with lilium convallium ; some 
with sweet-williams red ; some with beares-foot ; and 
the like low flowers, being withall sweet and sightly. 
Part of which heapes, to be with standards, of little 
bushes, prickt upon their top, and part without. The 
standards to be roses; juniper; holly; beareberries 
(but here and there, because of the smell of their blos- 
some ;) red currans ; gooseberries ; rosemary ; bayes ; 
sweetbriar; and such like. But these standards, to be 
kept with cutting, that they grow not out of course.” 

Just such, in all but the gooseberries and currants, 
was the wilderness of our garden : you came on it by 
a sudden labyrinthine twist at the end of a narrow 
alley of yew, and a sudden door in the high wall. My 
uncle said he liked well to see roses in the kitchen- 
garden, but not gooseberries in the flower-garden, es- 
pecially a wild flower-garden. Wherein lies the differ- 
ence, I never quite made out, but I feel a difference. 
My main delight in the wilderness was to see the 
roses among the heather — particularly the wild roses. 
When I was grown up, the wilderness always affected 
me like one of Blake’s or one of Beddoes’s yet wilder 
lyrics. To make it, my uncle had taken in a part of 
the heath, which came close up to the garden, leaving 


THE GARDEN. 


77 


plenty of the heather and ling. The protecting fence 
inclosed a good bit of the heath just as it was, so that 
the wilderness melted away into the heath, and into 
the wide moor — the fence, though contrived so as to 
be difficult to cross, being so low 7 that one had to look 
for it. 

Everywhere the inner garden was surrounded with 
brick walls, and hedges of yew within them ; but im- 
mediately behind the house, the wall to the lane was 
not very high. 


CHAPTER X. 


ONCE MORE A SECRET. 

One day in June I had gone into the garden about 
one o’clock, whether with or without object I forget. 
I had just seen my uncle start for Wittenage. Hear- 
ing a horse’s hoofs in the lane that ran along the out- 
side of the wall, I looked up. The same moment the 
horse stopped, and the face of his rider appeared over 
the wall, between two stems of yew and two great 
flowers of purple lilac, in shape like two perfect 
bunches of swarming bees. It was the face of a youth 
of eighteen, and beautiful with a right manly beauty. 

The moment I looked on this face, I fell into a 
sort of trance — that is, I entered for a moment some 
condition of existence beyond the ramparts of what 
commonly we call life. Love at first sight it was that 
initiated the strange experience. But understand me : 
real as what immediately followed was to the con- 
sciousness, there was no actual fact in it. 

I stood gazing. My eyes seemed drawn, and draw- 
ing my person toward the vision. Isolate over the 


ONCE MORE A SECRET. 


79 


garden-wall was the face; the rest of the man and all 
the horse were hidden behind it. Betwixt the yew 
stems and the two great lilac flowers — how heart and 
brain are yet filled with the old scent of them ! — my face, 
my mouth, my lips met his. I grew blind as with all 
my heart I kissed him. Then came a flash of icy terror, 
and a shudder which it frights me even now to recall. 
Instantly I knew that but a moment had passed, and 
that I had not moved an inch from the spot where 
first my eyes met his. 

But my eyes yet rested on his ; I could not draw 
them away. I could not free myself. Helplessness 
was growing agony. His voice broke the spell. He 
lifted his hunting-cap, and begged me to tell him the 
way to the next village. My self-possession returned, 
and the joy of its restoration drove from me any 
lingering embarrassment. I went forward, and with- 
out a faltering tone, I believe, gave him detailed 
directions. He told me afterward that, himself in a 
state of bewildered surprise, he thought me the coolest 
young person he had ever had the fortune to meet. 
Why should one be pleased to know that she looked 
quite different from what she felt ? There is some- 
thing wrong there, surely ! I acknowledge the some- 
thing wrong, but do not understand it. He lifted his 
cap again, and rode away. 

I stood still at the foot of the lilac-tree, and, from 


80 THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 

a vapor, condensed, not to a stone, but to a world, in 
which a new Flora was about to be developed. If no 
new spiritual sense was awakened in me, at least I 
was aware of a new consciousness. I had never been 
to myself what I was now. 

Terror again seized me : the face might once more 
look over the wall, and find me where it had left me ! 
I turned, and went slowly away from the house, gravi- 
tating to the darkest part of the garden. 

“What has come to me," I said, “that I seek the 
darkness ? Is this another secret ? Am I in the grasp 
of a new enemy ? " 

And with that came the whirlwind of perplexity. 
Must I go the first moment I knew I could find him, 
and tell my uncle what had happened, and how I felt ? 
or must I have, and hold, and cherish in silent heart, 
a thing so wondrous, so precious, so absorbing ? Had 
I not deliberately promised — of my own will and at 
my own instance — never again to have a secret from 
him ? Was this a secret ? Was it not a secret ? 

The storm was up, and went on. The wonder is 
that, in the fire of the new torment, I did not come to 
loathe the very thought of the young man — which 
would have delivered me, if not from the necessity of 
confession, yet from the main difficulty in confessing. 

I said to myself that the old secret was of a. wrong 
done to my uncle ; that what had made me miserable 


ONCE MORE A SECRET. 


8l 


then was a bad secret. The perception of this differ- 
ence gave me comfort for a time, but not for long. 
The fact remained, that I knew something concerning 
myself which my best friend did not know. It was, 
and I could not prevent it from being, a barrier be- 
tween us ? 

Yet what was it I was concealing from him? 
What had I to tell him ? How was I to represent a 
thing of which I knew neither the name nor the na- 
ture, a thing I could not describe ? Could I confess 
what I did not understand ? The thing might be 
what, in the tales I had read, was called love, but I 
did not know that it was. It might be something new, 
peculiar to myself ; something for which there was no 
word in the language ! How was I to tell ? I saw 
plainly that, if I tried to convey my new experience, I 
should not get beyond the statement that I had a new 
experience. It did not occur to me that the thing 
might be so well known, that a mere hint of the feel- 
ings concerned would enable any older person to 
classify the consciousness. I said to myself I should 
merely perplex my uncle. And in truth I believe that 
love, in every mind in which it arises, will vary in 
color and form — will always partake of that mind’s 
individual isolation in difference. This, however, is 
nothing to the present point. 

Comfort myself as I might, that the impossible 


82 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


was required of no one, and granted that the thing 
was impossible, it was none the less a cause of misery, 
a present disaster : I was aware, and soon my uncle 
would be aware, of an impenetrable something sepa- 
rating us. I felt that we had already begun to grow 
strange to each other, and the feeling lay like death 
at my heart. 

Our lessons together were still going on ; that I 
was no longer a child had made only the difference 
that progress must make ; and I had no thought that 
they would not thus go on always. They were never 
for a moment irksome to me ; I might be tired by 
them, but never of them. We were regularly at work 
together by seven, and after half an hour for break- 
fast, resumed work ; at half-past eleven our lessons 
were over. But although the day was then clear of 
the imperative, much the greater part of it was in 
general passed in each other’s company. We might 
not speak a word, but we would be hours together in 
the study. We might not speak a word, but we would 
be hours together on horseback. 

For this day, then, our lessons were over, and my 
uncle was from home. This was an indisputable re- 
lief, yet the fact that it was so pained me keenly, for 
I recognized in it the first of the schism. How I got 
through the day I can not tell. I was in a dream, 
not all a dream of delight. Haunted with the face I 


ONCE MORE A SECRET. 


83 


had seen, and living in the new consciousness it had 
waked in me, I spent most of it in the garden, now in 
the glooms of the yew-walks, and now in the smiling 
■wilderness. It was odd, however, that, although I 
was not expected to be in my uncle’s room at any time 
but that of lessons, all the morning I had a feeling as 
if I ought to be there, while yet glad that my uncle 
was not there. 

It was late before he returned, and I went to bed. 
Perhaps I retired so soon that I might not have to 
look into his eyes. Usually, I sat up now until he came 
home I was long in getting to sleep, and then I 
dreamed. I thought I was out in the storm, and the 
flash came which revealed the horse and his rider, but 
they were both different. The horse in the dream was 
black as coal, as if carved out of the night itself ; and 
the man upon him was the beautiful stranger whose 
horse I had not seen for the garden-wall. The dark- 
ness fell, and the voice of my uncle called to me. I 
waited for him in the storm with a troubled heart, for I 
knew he had not seen that vision, and I could no more 
tell him of it, than could Christabel tell her father 
what she had seen after she lay down. I woke, but 
my waking was no relief. 


CHAPTER XI. 


THE MOLE BURROWS. 

I slept again after my dream, and do not know 
whether he came into my room as he generally did 
when he had not said good-night to me. Of course I 
woke unhappy, and the morning-world had lost some- 
thing of its natural glow, its lovely freshness : it was 
not this time a thing new-born of the creating word. 
I dawdled with my dressing. The face kept coming, 
and brought me no peace, yet brought me something 
for which it seemed worth while even to lose my peace. 
But I did not know then, and do not yet know, what 
the loss of peace actually means. I only know that it 
must be something far more terrible than anything I 
have ever known. I remained so far true to my uncle, 
however, that not even for what the face seemed to 
promise me would I have consented to cause him 
trouble. For what I saw in the face, I would do 
anything, I thought, except that. 

I went to him at the usual hour, determined that 
nothing should distract me from my work — that he 


THE MOLE BURROWS. 


85 

should perceive no difference in me. I was not at 
the moment awake to the fact that here again were 
love and deception hand in hand. But another love 
than mine was there : my uncle loved me immeasur- 
ably more than I yet loved that heavenly vision. True 
love is keen-sighted as the eagle, and my uncle’s love 
was love true, therefore he saw what I soughLto hide. 
It is only the shadow of love, generally a grotesque, 
ugly thing, like so many other shadows, that is blind 
either to the troubles or the faults of the shadow it 
seems to love. The moment our eyes met, I saw that 
he saw something in mine that was not there when 
last we parted. But he said nothing, and we sat down 
to our lessons. Every now and then as they proceeded, 
however, I felt rather than saw his eyes rest on me 
for a moment, questioning. I had never known them 
rest on me so before. Plainly he was aware of some 
change ; and could there be anything different in the 
relation of two who so long had loved each other, 
without something being less well and good than be- 
fore ? Nor was it indeed wonderful he should see a 
difference ; for, with all the might of my resolve to do 
even better than usual, I would now and then find 
myself unconscious of what either of us had last been 
saying. The face had come yet again, and driven 
everything from its presence ! I grew angry — not 
with the youth, but with his face, for appearing so 


86 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


often when I did not invite it. Once I caught myself 
on the verge of crying out, “ Can’t you wait ? I will 
come presently ! ” and my uncle looked up as if I had 
spoken. Perhaps he had as good as heard the words; 
he possessed what almost seemed a supernatural fac- 
ulty of divining the thought of another — not, I was 
sure, by any effort to perceive it, but by involuntary 
intuition. He uttered no inquiring word, but a light 
sigh escaped him, which all but made me burst into 
tears. I was on one side of a widening gulf, and he 
on the other ! 

Our lessons ended, he rose immediately and left the 
room. Five minutes passed, and then came the clatter 
of his horse’s feet on the stones of the yard. A mo- 
ment more, and I heard him ride away at a quick trot. 
I burst into tears where I still sat beside my uncle’s 
empty chair. I was weary like one in a dream search- 
ing in vain for a spot whereupon to set down her 
heart-breaking burden. There was no one but my 
uncle to whom I could tell any trouble, and the trouble 
I could not have told him had hitherto been unimagin- 
able ! From this my reader may judge what a trouble 
it was that I could not tell him my trouble. I was a 
traitor to my only friend! Had I begun to love him 
less ? had I begun to turn away from him ? I dared 
not believe it. That would have been to give eternity 
to my misery. But it might be that at heart I was a 


THE MOLE BURROWS. gy 

bad, treacherous girl ! I had again a secret from him ! 
I was not with him ! 

I went into the garden. The day was sultry and 
oppressive. Coolness or comfort was nowhere. I 
sought the shadow of the live yew-walls; there was 
shelter in the shadow, but it oppressed the lungs while 
it comforted the eyes. Not a breath of wind breathed ; 
the atmosphere seemed to have lost its life-giving. I 
went out into the wilderness. There the air was filled 
and heaped with the odors of the heavenly plants that 
crowded its humble floor, but they gave me no wel- 
come. Between two bushes that flamed out roses, I 
lay down, and the heather and the rose-trees closed 
above me. My mind was in such a confusion of pain 
and pleasure — not without a hope of deliverance some- 
where in its clouded sky — that I could think no more, 
and fell asleep. 

I imagine that, had I never again seen the young 
man, I should not have suffered. I think that, by slow 
natural degrees, his phantasmal presence would have 
ceased to haunt me, and gradually I should have re- 
turned to my former condition. I do not mean I 
should have forgotten him, but neither should I have 
been troubled when I thought of him. I know I should 
never have regretted having seen him. In that, I had 
nothing to blame myself for, and should have felt, 
not that a glory had passed away from the earth, but 


88 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


that I had had a vision of bliss. What it was, I should 
not have had the power to recall, but it would have 
left with me the faith that I had beheld something too 
ethereal for my memory to store. I should have con- 
soled myself both with the dream, and with the con- 
viction that I should not dream it again. The peace- 
ful sense of recovered nearness to my uncle would 
have been far more precious than the dream. The 
sudden fire of transfiguration that had for a moment 
flamed out of the All, and straightway withdrawn, 
would have become a memory only ; but none the 
less would that enlargement of the child-way of seeing 
things have remained with me. I do not think that 
would ever have left me : it is the care of the prudent 
wise that bleaches the grass, and is as the fumes of 
sulphur to the red rose of life. 

Outwearied with inward conflict, I slept a dream- 
less sleep. 


CHAPTER XII. 


A LETTER. 

A cool soft breeze went through the curtains of 
my couch, and I awoke. The blooms of the peasant- 
briars and the court-roses were waving together over 
my head. The sigh of the wind had breathed itself 
out over the far heath, and, ere it died in my fairy for- 
est of lowly plants and bushes, had found and fanned 
the cheeks that lay down hot and athirst for air. It 
gave me new life, and I rose refreshed. Something 
fluttered to the ground. I thought it was a leaf from 
a white rose above me, but I looked. At my feet lay 
a piece of paper. I took it up. It had been folded 
very hastily, and had no address, but who could have 
a better right to unfold it than I ! It might be noth- 
ing; it might be a letter. Should I open it? Should 
I not rather seize the opportunity of setting things 
right between my heart and my uncle by taking it to 
him unopened ? Only, if it were indeed — I dared 
hardly even in thought complete the supposition — 
might it not be a wrong to the youth ? Might not the 


9 o 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


paper contain a confidence? might it not be the mes- 
senger of a heart that trusted me before even it knew 
my name ? Would I inaugurate our acquaintance with 
an act of treachery, or at least distrust ? Right or 
wrong, thus my heart reasoned, and to its reasoning I 
gave heed. “ It will,” I said, “ be time enough to re- 
solve when I know concerning what ! ” This, I now 
see, was juggling; for the question was whether I 
should be open with my uncle or not. “ It might be,” 
I said to myself, “ that, the moment I knew the con- 
tents of the paper, I should reproach myself that I had 
not read it at once ! ” 

I sat down on a bush of .heather, and unfolded it. 
This is what I found, written with a pencil : 

“ I am the man to whom you talked so kindly over 
your garden wall yesterday. I fear you may think me 
presuming and impertinent. Presuming I may be, but 
impertinent surely not ! If I were, would not my 
heart tell me so, seeing it is all on your side ? 

“ My name is John Day; I do not yet know yours. 
I have not dared to inquire after it, lest I should hear 
of some impassable gulf between us. The fear of such 
a gulf haunts me. I can think of nothing but the 
face I saw over the wall through the clusters of lilac : 
the wall seems to keep rising and rising, as if it would 
hide you forever. 

“ Is it wrong to think thus of you without your 


A LETTER. 


91 


leave ? If one may not love the loveliest, then is the 
world but a fly-trap hung in the great heaven, to catch 
and ruin souls ! 

“ If I am writing nonsense — I can not tell whether 
I am or not — it is because my wits wander with my 
eyes to gaze at you through the leaves of the wild 
white rose under which you are asleep. Loveliest of 
faces, may no gentlest wind of thought ripple thy per- 
fect calm, until I have said what I must, and laid it 
where she will find it ! 

“ I live at Rising, the manor-house over the heath. 
I am the son of Lady Cairnedge by a former marriage. 
I am twenty years of age, and have just ended my last 
term at Oxford. May I come and see you ? If you 
will not see me, why then did you walk into my quiet 
house, and turn everything upside down ? I shall 
come to-night, in the dusk, and wait in the heather, 
outside the fence. If you come, thank God ! if you 
do not, I shall believe you could not, and come again 
and again and again, till hope is dead. But I warn 
you I am a terrible hoper. 

“ It would startle, perhaps offend you, to wake 
and see me; but I can not bear to leave you 
asleep. Something might come too near you. I 
will write until you move, and then make haste 
to go. 

“ My heart swells with words too shy to go out. 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


9 2 

Surely a Will has brought us together ! I believe in 
fate, never in chance ! 

“ When we see each other again, will the wall be 
down between us, or shall I know it will part us all 
our mortal lives ? Longer than that it can not. If 
you say to me, ‘ I must not see you, but I will think 
of you,’ not one shall ever know I have other than a 
light heart. Even now I begin the endeavor to be 
such that, when we meet at last, as meet we must, you 
shall not say, ‘ Is this the man, alas, who dared to 
love me ! ’ 

“ I love you as one might love a woman-angel 
who, at the merest breath going to fashion a word un- 
fit, would spread her wings and soar. Do not, I pray 
you, fear to let me come ! There are things that must 
be done in faith, else they never have being : let this 
be one of .them. — You stir.” 

As I came to these last words, hurriedly written, I 
heard behind me, over the height, the quick gallop of 
a horse, and knew the piece of firm turf he was cross- 
ing. The same moment I was there in spirit, and the 
imagination was almost vision. I saw him speeding 
away — “ to come again ! ” said my heart, solemn with 
gladness. 

Rising-manor was the house to which the lady 
took me that dread night when first I knew what it 
was to be alone in darkness and silence and space. 


A LETTER. 


93 


Was that lady his mother ? Had she rescued me for 
her son ? I was not willing to believe it, though I had 
never actually seen her. The way was mostly dark, 
and during the latter portion of it I was much too 
weary to look up where she sat on her great horse. I 
had never to my knowledge heard who lived at Ris- 
ing. I was not born inquisitive, and there were miles 
between us. 

I sat still, without impulse to move a finger. I 
lived essentially. Now I knew what had come to me. 
It was no merely idiosyncratic experience, for the 
youth had the same : it was love ! How otherwise 
could we thus be drawn together from both sides! 
Verily it seemed also good enough to be that won- 
drous thing ever on the lips of poets and tale-weaving 
magicians ! Was it not far beyond any notion of it 
their words had give me ? 

But my uncle ! There lay bitterness ! Was I in- 
deed false to him, that now the thought of him was a 
pain? Had I begun a new life apart from him? To 
tell him would perhaps check the terrible separation ! 
But how was I to tell him ? For the first time I knew 
that I had no mother ! Would Mr. Day’s mother be 
my mother too, and help me ? But from no woman 
save my own mother, hardly even from her, would I 
ask mediation with the uncle I had loved and trusted 
all my life and with my whole heart. I had never 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


94 

known father or mother, save as he had been father 
and mother and everybody to me ! What was I to 
do ? Gladly would I have hurried to some desert 
place, and there waited for the light I needed. That 
I was no longer in any uncertainty as to the word 
that described my condition, did not, I found, make it 
easy to use the word. “ Perhaps,” I argued, strug- 
gling in the toils of my new liberty, “ my uncle knows 
nothing of this kind of love, and would be unable to 
understand me ! Suppose I confessed to him what I 
felt toward a man I had spoken to but once, and then 
only to tell him the way to Dumbleton, would he not 
think me out of my mind ? ” 

At length I bethought me that, so long as I did 
not know what to do, I was not required to do any- 
thing ; I must wait till I did know what to do. But 
with the thought came suffering enough to be the 
wages of any sin that, so far as I knew, I had ever 
committed. For the conviction awoke that already 
the love that had hitherto been the chief joy of my 
being had begun to pale and fade. Was it possible I 
was ceasing to love my uncle ? What could any love 
be worth if mine should fail my uncle ! Love itself 
must be a mockery, and life but a ceaseless sliding 
down to the death of indifference ! Even if I never 
ceased to love him, it was just as bad to love him 
less ! Had he not been everything to me ? — and this 


A LETTER. 


95 

man, what had he ever done for me ? Doubtless we 
are to love even our enemies ; but are we to love them 
as tenderly as we love our friends ? Or are we to love 
the friend of yesterday, of whom we know nothing 
though we may believe everything, as we love those 
who have taken all the trouble to make true men and 
women of us ? “ What can be the matter with my 

soul ? ” I said. “ Can that soul be right made, in 
which one love begins to wither the moment another 
begins to grow ? If I be so made, I can not help be- 
ing worthless ! ” 

It was then first, I think, that I received a notion 
— anything like a true notion, that is — of my need of a 
God, whence afterward I came to see the one need of 
the whole race. Of course, not being able to make 
ourselves, it needed a God to make us; but that mak- 
ing were a small thing indeed, if he left us so un- 
finished that we could come to nothing right; — if he 
left us so that we could think or do or be nothing right ; 
— if our souls were created so puny, for instance, that 
there was not room in them to love as they could not 
help loving, without ceasing to love where they were 
bound by every obligation to love right heartily, and 
more and more deeply ! But had I not been growing 
all the time I had been in the world ? There must 
then be the possibility of growing still ! If there was 
not room in me, there must be room in God for me 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


96 

to become larger ! The room in God must be made 
room in me ! God had not done making me, in fact, 
and I sorely needed him to go on making me ; I sorely 
needed to be made out! What if this new joy and 
this new terror had come, had been sent, in order to 
make me grow ? At least the doors were open ; I 
could go out and forsake myself ! If a living power 
had caused me — and certainly I did not cause myself 
— then that living power knew all about me, knew 
every smallness that distressed me ! Where should I 
find him ? He could not be so far that the misery of one 
of his own children could not reach him ! I turned my 
face into the grass, and prayed as I had never prayed 
before. I had always gone to church, and made the 
responses attentively, while I knew that was not pray- 
ing, and tried to pray better than that ; but now I was 
really asking from God something I sorely wanted. 
“ Father in heaven,” I said, “ I am so miserable ! 
Please, help me ! ” 

I rose, went into the house, and up to the study, 
took a sock I was knitting for my uncle, and sat down 
to wait what would come. I could think no more ; I 
could only wait. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


OLD LOVE AND NEW. 

While I waited, as nearly a log, under the weari- 
ness of spiritual unrest, as a girl could well be, the 
door opened. Very seldom did that door open to any 
one but my uncle or myself : he would let no one but 
me touch his books, or even dust the room. I jumped 
from the chest where I sat. 

It was only Martha Moon. 

“How you startled me, Martha! ” I cried. 

“ No wonder, child ! ” she answered. “ I come 
with bad news ! Your uncle has had a fall. He is 
laid up at Wittenage with a broken right arm.” 

I burst into tears. 

“ Oh, Martha,” I cried ; “ I must go to him ! ” 

“ He has sent for me,” she answered quietly. “ Dick 
is putting the horse to the phaeton.” 

“ He doesn’t want me, then ! ” I said ; but it seemed 
a voice not my own that shrieked the words. 

The punishment of my sin was upon me. Never 
would he have sent for Martha and not me, I thought, 
14 


gS THE flight of the shadow. 

had he not seen that I had gone wrong again, and 
was no more to be trusted. 

“ My dear,” said Martha, “ which of us two ought to 
be the better nurse? You never saw your uncle ill; 
I’ve nursed him at death’s door ! ” 

“Then you don’t think he is angry with me, 
Martha?” I said, humbled before myself. 

“ Was he ever angry with you, Orbie ? What is 
there to be angry about ? I never saw him even dis- 
pleased with you ! ” 

I had not realized that my uncle was suffering — 
only that he was disabled ; now the fact flashed upon 
me, and with it the perception that I had been think- 
ing only of myself : I was fast ceasing to care for 
him ! And then, horrible to tell ! a flash of joy went 
through me that he would not be home that day, and 
therefore I could not tell him anything ! 

The moment Martha left me I threw myself on the 
floor of the desert room. I was in utter misery. 

“ Gladly would I bear every pang of his pain,” I 
said to myself ; “ yet I have not asked one question 
about his accident ! He must be in danger, or he 
would not have sent for Martha instead of me ! ” 

How had the thing happened, I wondered. Had 
Death fallen with him — perhaps on him ? He was 
such a horseman, I could not think he had been 
thrown. Besides, Death was a good horse who loved 


OLD LOVE AND NEW. 


99 


his master — dearly, I was sure, and would nev-er have 
thrown him or let him fall ! A great gush of the old 
love poured from the fountain in my heart : sympathy 
with the horse had unsealed it. I sprang from the 
floor, and ran down to entreat Martha to take me with 
her : if my uncle did not want me, I could return with 
Dick ! But she was gone. Even the sound of her 
wheels was gone. I had lain on the floor longer than 
I knew. 

I went back to the study a little relieved. I under- 
stood now that I was not glad he was disabled ; that 
I was anything but glad he was suffering; that I 
had only been glad for an instant that the crisis of 
my perplexity was postponed. In the mean time I 
should see John Day, who would help me to under- 
stand what I ought to do! 

Very strange were my feelings that afternoon in 
the lonely house. I had always felt it lonely when 
Martha, never when my uncle, was out. Yet when my 
uncle was in, I was mostly with him, and seldom more 
than a few minutes at a time with Martha. Our feelings 
are odd creatures! Now that both were away, there 
was neither time nor space in my heart for feeling the 
house desolate ; while the world outside was rich as a 
treasure-house of mighty kings. The moment I was a 
little more comfortable with myself, my thoughts went 
in a flock to the face that looked over the garden-wall, 


IOO 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


to the man that watched me while I slept, the man 
that wrote that lovely letter. Inside was old Penny 
with her broom ; she took advantage of every absence 
to sweep or scour or dust; outside was John Day, and 
the roses of the wilderness ! He was waiting the hour 
to come for me, wondering how I would receive him ! 

Slowly went the afternoon. I had fallen in love at 
first sight, it is true : not therefore was I eager to 
meet my lover. I was only more than willing to see 
him. It was as sweet, or nearly as sweet, to dream of 
his coming, as to have him before me — so long as I 
knew he was indeed coming. I was just a little 
anxious lest I should not find him altogether so beau- 
tiful as I was imagining him. That he was good, I 
never doubted : could I otherwise have fallen in love 
with him ? And his letter was so straightforward — so 
manly ! 

The afternoon was cloudy, and the twilight came 
the sooner. From the realms of the dark, where all 
the birds of night build their nests, lining them with 
their own sooty down, the sweet odorous filmy dusk of 
the summer, haunted with wings of noiseless bats, be- 
gan at length to come flickering earthward, in a snow 
infinitesimal of fluffiest gray and black : I crept out 
into the garden. It was dark as wintry night among 
the yews, but I could have gone any time through every 
alley of them blindfolded. An owl cried and I started, 


OLD LOVE AND NEW. 


IOI 


for my soul was sunk in its own love-dawn. There 
came a sudden sense of light as I opened the door into 
the wilderness, but light how thin and pale, and how 
full of expectation ! The earth and the vast air, up to 
the great vault, seemed to throb and heave with life — 
or was it that my spirit lay an open thoroughfare to 
the life of the All ? With the scent of the roses and 
the humbler sweet-odored inhabitants of the wilder- 
ness ; with the sound of the brook that ran through it, 
flowing from the heath and down the hill ; with the 
silent starbeams, and the insects that make all the 
little noises they can ; with the thoughts that went out 
of me, and returned possessed of the earth ; — with all 
these, and the sense of thought eternal, the universe 
was full as it could hold.* I stood in the doorway of 
the wall, and looked out on the wild: suddenly, by 
some strange reaction, it seemed out of creation’s 
doors, out in the illimitable, given up to the bare, to 
the space that had no walls ! A shiver ran through 
me; I turned back among the yews. It was early; 
I would wait yet a while ! If he were already there, 
he too would enjoy the calm of a lovely little 
wait. 

A small wind came searching about, and found, 
and caressed me. I turned to it ; it played with my 
hair, and cooled my face. After a while I left the 
alley, passed out, closed the door behind me, and went 


102 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


straying through the broken ground of the wilder- 
ness, among the low bushes, meandering, as if with 
some frolicsome brook for a companion — a brook of 
capricious windings — but still coming nearer to the 
fence that parted the wilderness from the heath, my 
eyes bent down, partly to avoid the hillocks and 
bushes, and partly from shyness of the moment when 
first I should see him who was in my heart and some- 
where near. Softly the moon rose, round and full. 
There was still so much light in the sky that she made 
no sudden change, and for a moment I did not feel 
her presence or look up. In front of me, the high 
ground of the moor sank into a hollow, deeply indent- 
ing the horizon-line : the moon was rising just in the 
gap, and when I did look up, the lower edge of her disk 
was just clear of the earth, and the head of a man 
looking over the fence was in the middle of the great 
moon. It was like the head of a saint in a missal, girt 
with a halo of solid gold. I could not see the face, for 
the halo hid it, as such attributions are apt to do, but 
it must be he; and strengthened by the heavenly 
vision, I went toward him. Walking less carefully 
than before, however, I caught my foot, stumbled, and 
fell. There came a rush through the bushes : he was 
by my side, lifted me like a child, and held me in his 
arms; neither was I more frightened than a child 
caught up in the arms of any well-known friend : I 


OLD LOVE AND NEW. 


103 


had been bred in faith, and not mistrust ! But indeed 
my head had struck the ground with such force, that, 
had I been inclined, I could scarcely have resisted — 
though why should I have resisted, being where I 
would be ! Does not philosophy tell us that growth 
and development, cause and effect, are all, and that 
the days and years are of no account ? And does 
not more than philosophy tell us that truth is every- 
thing ? 

“ My darling ! Are you hurt ? ” murmured the 
voice, whose echoes seemed to have haunted me for 
cent-uries. 

“ A little,” I answered. “ I shall be all right in a 
minute.” I did not add, “ Put me down, please ; ” 
for I did not want to be put down directly. I 
could not have stood if he had put me down. I grew 
faint. 

Life came back, and I felt myself growing heavy 
in his arms. 

“ I think I can stand now,” I said. “ Please put 
me down.” 

He obeyed immediately. 

“ I've nearly broken your arms,” I said, ashamed 
of having become a burden to him the moment we 
met. 

“ I could run with you to the top of the hill,” he 
answered. 


104 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ I don’t think you could,” I returned. 

Perhaps I leaned a little toward him ; I do not 
know. He put his arm round me. 

“ You are not able to stand,” he said. “ Shall we 
sit a moment ? ” 


CHAPTER XIV. 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 

I was glad enough to sink on a clump of white 
clover. He stretched himself on the heather, .a little 
way from me. Silence followed. He was giving me 
time to recover myself. As soon, therefore, as I was 
able, it was my part to speak. 

“ Where is your horse ? ” I asked. 

The first word is generally one hardly worth say- 
ing. 

“ I left him at a little farmhouse, about a mile 
from here. I was afraid to bring him farther, lest my 
mother should learn where I had been. She takes 
pains to know.” 

“ Then will she not find out ? ” 

“ I don’t know.” 

“ Will she not ask you where you were ? ” 

“ Perhaps. There’s no knowing.” 

“ You will tell her, of course, if she does ?” 

“ I think not.” 


“ Oughtn’t you ? ” 


io 6 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ No." 

“ You are sure ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“You don’t mean you will tell her a story?” 

“ Certainly not.” 

“ What will you do, then ? ”• 

“ I will tell her that I will not tell her.” 

“ Would that be right ? ” 

Through the dusk I could see the light of his smile 
as he answered, 

“ I think so. I shall not tell her.” 

• “ But,” I began. 

He interrupted me. 

My heart was sinking within me. Not only had I 
wanted him to help me to tell my uncle, but I shud- 
dered at the idea of having with any man a secret 
from his mother. 

“ It must look strange to you,” he said; “ but you 
do not know my mother ! ” 

“ I think I do know your mother,” I rejoined. 
“ She saved my poor little life once. — I am not sure 
it was your mother, but I think it was.” 

“ How was that ? ” he said, much surprised. “ When 
was it ? ” 

“ Many years ago — I can not tell how many,” I an- 
swered. “But I remember all about it well enough. 
I can not have been more than eight, I imagine.” 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 


107 


“ Could she have been at the manor, then ? ” he 
said, putting the question to himself, not me. “ How 
was it? Tell me,” he went on, rising to his feet, and 
looking at me with almost a frightened expression. 

I told him the incident, and he heard me in abso- 
lute silence. When I had done, — 

“It was my mother!” he broke out; “I don’t 
know one other woman who would have let a child 
walk like that ! Any other would have taken you up, 
or put you on the horse and walked beside you ! ” 

“ A gentleman would, I know,” I replied. “ But it 
would not be so easy for a lady ! ” 

“ She could have done either well enough. She’s 
as strong as a horse herself, and rides like an Ama- 
zon. But I am not in the least surprised: it was just 
like her! You poor little darling! It nearly makes 
me cry to think of the tiny feet going tramp, tramp, 
all that horrible way, and she high up on her big 
horse ! She always rides the biggest horse she can 
get ! — And then never to say a word to you after she 
brought you home, or see you the next morning ! ” 

“ Mr. Day,” I returned, “ I would not have told 
you, had I known it would give you occasion to speak 
so naughtily of your mother. You make me un- 
happy.” 

He was silent. I thought he was ashamed of him- 
self, and was sorry for him. But my sympathy was 


X08 the flight of the shadow. 

wasted. He broke into a murmuring laugh of merri- 
ment. 

“ When is a mother not a mother ? ” he said. — “ Do 
you give it up ? — When she’s a north wind. When 
she’s a Roman emperor. When she’s an iceberg. 
When she’s a brass tiger. — There ! that’ll do. Good- 
by, mother, for the present ! I mayn’t know much, as 
she’s always telling me, but I do know that a noun is 
not a thing, nor a name a person ! ” 

I would have expostulated. 

“For love’s sake, dearest,” he pleaded, “we will 
not dispute where only one of us knows ! I will tell 
you all some day — soon, I hope, very soon. I am 
angry now ! — Poor little tramping child ! ” 

I saw I had been behaving presumptuously : I had 
wanted to argue while yet in absolute ignorance of 
the thing in hand ? Had not my uncle taught me the 
folly of reasoning from the ideal where I knew noth- 
ing of the actual ! The ideal must be our guide how 
to treat the actual, but the actual must be there to 
treat ! One thing more I saw — that there could be no 
likeness between his mother and my uncle ! 

“ Will you tell me something about yourself, 
then ? ” I said. 

“ That would not be interesting! ” he objected. 

“Then why are you here?” I returned. “Can 
any person without a history be interesting ? ” 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 


IO9 

“ Yes,” he answered ; “ a person that was going to 
have a history might be interesting.” 

“ Could a person with a history that was not 
worth telling be interesting ? But I know yours will 
interest me in the hearing, therefore it ought to inter- 
est you in the telling.” 

“ I see,” he rejoined, with his merry laugh, “ I 
shall have to be careful ! My lady will at once pounce 
upon the weak points of my logic ! ” 

“ I am no logician,” I answered ; “ I only know 
when I don’t know a thing. My uncle has taught me 
that wisdom lies in that.” 

“Yours must be a very unusual kind of uncle!” 
he returned. 

“ If God had made many men like my uncle, I 
think the world wouldn’t be the same place.” 

“ I wonder why he didn’t 1 ” he said thoughtfully. 

“ I have wondered much, and can not tell,” I re- 
plied. 

“What if it wouldn’t be good for the world to 
have many good men in it before it was ready to treat 
them properly ? ” he suggested. 

The words let me know that at least he could 
think. Hitherto my uncle had seemed to me the only 
man that thought. But I had seen very few men. 

“ Perhaps that is it,” I answered. “ I will think 
about it. — Were you brought up at Rising? Have 


no 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


you been there all the time ? Were you there that 
night ? I should surely have known had you been in 
the house 1 ” 

He looked at me with a grateful smile. 

I was not brought up there, ” he answered. 
“ Rising is mine, however — at least it will be when I 
eome of age ; it was left some ten years ago by a 
great-aunt. My father’s property will be mine too, of 
course. My mother’s is in Ireland. She ought to be 
there, not here ; but she likes my estates better than 
her own, and makes the most of being my guard- 
ian.” 

“ You would not have her there if she is happier 
here ? ” 

“ All who have land ought to live on it, or else 
give it to those who will. What makes it theirs, if 
their only connection with it is the money it brings 
them ? If I let my horse run wild over the country, 
how could I claim him, and refuse to pay his dam- 
ages ? ” 

“I don’t quite understand you.” 

“ I only mean there is no bond where both ends 
are not tied. My mother has no sense of obligation, 
so far as ever I have been able to see. But do not be 
afraid: I would as soon take a wife to the house she 
was in, as I would ask her to creep with me into the 
den of a hyena.” 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 


Ill 


It was too dreadful! I rose. He sprang to his 
feet. 

“ You must excuse me, sir ! ” I said. “ With one 
who can speak so of his mother, I am where I ought 
not to be.” 

“ You have a right to know what my mother is,” 
he answered — coldly, I thought ; “ and I should not 
be a true man if I spoke of her otherwise than truly.” 

He would pretend nothing to please me ! I saw 
that I was again in the wrong. Was I so ill read as to 
imagine that a mother must of necessity be a good 
woman ? Was he to speak of his mother as he did not 
believe of her, or be unfit for my company ? Would 
untruth be a bond between us ? 

“ I beg your pardon,” I said ; “ I was wrong. But 
you can hardly wonder I should be shocked to hear a 
son speak so of his mother — and to one all but a 
stranger ! ” 

“What!” he returned, with a look of surprise.; 
“ do you think of me so ? I feel as if I had known 
you all my life — and before it ! ” 

I felt ashamed, and was silent. If he was such a 
stranger, why was I there alone with him ? 

“ You must not think I speak so to any one,” he 
went on. “ Of those who know my mother, not one 
has a right to demand of me anything concerning her. 
But how could I ask you to see me, and hide from you 


1 12 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


the truth about her ? Prudence would tell you to have 
nothing to do with the son of such a woman : could I 
be a true man, true to you, and hold my tongue about 
her ? I should be a liar of the worst sort ! ” 

He felt far too strongly, it was plain, to heed a 
world of commonplaces. 

“ Forgive me,” I said. “ May I sit down again ? ” 

He held out his hand. I took it, and reseated my- 
self on the clover-hillock. He laid himself again be- 
side me, and after a little silence began to relate what 
occurred to him of his external history, while all the 
time I was watching for hints as to how he had come 
to be the man he was. It was clear he did not find it 
easy to talk about himself. But soon I no longer 
doubted whether I ought to have met him, and loved 
him a great deal more by the time he had done. 

I then told him in return what my life had hitherto 
been ; how I knew nothing of father or mother ; how 
my uncle had been everything to me; how he had 
taught me all I knew, had helped me to love what was 
good and hate what was evil, had enabled me to value 
good books and turn away from foolish ones. In 
short, I made him feel that all his mother had not 
been to him, my uncle had been to me ; and that it 
would take a long time to make me as much indebted 
to a husband as already I was to my uncle. Then I 
put the question : 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 


”3 

“What would you think of me if I had a secret 
from an uncle like that ? ” 

“ If I had an uncle like that,” he answered, “ I 
would sooner cut my throat than keep anything from 
Him ! ” 

“ I have not told him,” I said, “ what happened to- 
day — or yesterday.” 

“But you will tell him?” 

u The first moment I can. But I hope you under- 
stand it is hard to do. My love for my uncle makes it 
hard. It has the look of turning away from him to 
love another ! ” 

With that I burst out crying. I could not help it. 
He let me cry, and did not interfere. I was grateful 
for that. When at length I raised my head, he 
spoke. 

“ It has that look,” he said ; “but I trust it is only 
a look. Anyhow, he knows that such things must be ; 
and the more of a good man and a gentleman he is, 
the less will he be pained that we should love one 
another ! ” 

“ I am sure of that,” I replied. “ I am only afraid 
that he may never have been in love himself, and does 
not know how it feels, and may think I have forsaken 
him for you.” 

“ Are you with him ahvays? ” 

“ No ; I am sometimes a good deal alone. I can 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


1 14 

be alone as much as I like ; he always gives me perfect 
liberty. But I never before wanted to be alone when 
I could be with him.” 

“ But he could live without you ? ” 

“Yes, indeed!” I cried. “He would be a poor 
creature that could not live without another ! ” 

He said nothing, and I added, 

“ He often goes out alone — sometimes in the dark- 
est nights.” 

“ Then be sure he knows what love is. — But, if you 
would rather, I will tell him.” 

“ I could not have any one, even you, tell my uncle 
about me.” 

“You are right. When will you tell him ? ” 

“ I can not be sure. I would go to him to-morrow, 
but I am afraid they will not let me until he has got a 
little over this accident,” I answered — and told him 
what had happened. “ It is dreadful to think how he 
must have suffered,” I said, “ and how much more I 
should have thought about it but for you ! It tears 
my heart. Why wasn’t it made bigger ? ” 

“Perhaps that is just what is now being done with 
it ! ” he answered. 

“ I hope it may be ! ” I returned. — “ But it is time 
I went in.” 

“ Shall I not see you again to-morrow evening ? ” 
he asked. 


MOTHER AND UNCLE. 


115 

“ No,” I answered. “ I must not see you again till 
have told my uncle everything.” 

“You do not mean for weeks and weeks — till he is 
well enough to come home ? How am I to live till 
then ? ” 

“As I shall have to live. But I hope it will be but 
for a few days at most. Only, then, it will depend on 
what my uncle thinks of the thing.” 

“ Will he decide for you what you are to do ? ” 

“Yes — I think so. Perhaps if he were — ” 

I was on the point of saying, “like your mother,” 
but I stopped in time — or hardly, for I think he saw 
what I just saved myself from. 

It was but the other morning I made the discovery 
that, all our life together, John has never once pressed 
me to complete a sentence I broke off. 

He looked so sorrowful that I was driven to add 
something. 

“ I don’t think there is much good,” I said, “ in 
resolving what you will or will not do, before the oc- 
casion appears, for it may have something in it you 
never reckoned on. All I can say is, I will try to do 
what is right. I can not promise anything without 
knowing what my uncle thinks.” 

We rose; he took me in his arms for just an in- 
stant ; and we parted with the understanding that I was 
to write to him as soon as I had spoken with my uncle. 


CHAPTER XV. 


THE TIME BETWEEN. 

I now felt quite able to confess to my uncle both 
what I had thought and what I had done. True, I 
had much more to confess than when my trouble first 
awoke; but the growth in the matter of the confes- 
sion had been such a growth in definiteness as well, as 
to make its utterance, though more weighty, yet much 
easier. If I might be in doubt about revealing my 
thoughts, I could be in none about revealing my ac- 
tions; and I found it was much less appalling to make 
known my feelings, when I had the words of John Day 
to confess as well. 

I may here be allowed to remark, how much easier 
an action is when demanded, than it seems while in 
the contingent future — how much easier when the 
thing is before you in its reality, and not as a mere 
thought-specter. The thing itself, and the idea of it, 
are two such different grounds upon which to come 
either to a decision or to action ! 

One thing more : when a woman, wants to do the 


THE TIME BETWEEN. 


II 7 

right — I do not mean, wants to coax the right to side 
with her — she will, somehow, be led up to it. 

My uncle was very feverish and troubled the first 
night, and had a good deal of delirium, during which 
his care and anxiety seemed all about me. Martha 
had to assure him every other moment that I was well, 
and in no danger of any sort : he would be silent for 
a time, and then again show himself tormented with 
forebodings about me. In the morning, however, he 
was better; only he looked sadder than usual. She 
thought he was, for some cause or other, in reality 
anxious about me. So much I gathered from Mar- 
tha’s letter, by no means scholarly, but graphic 
enough. 

It gave me much pain. My uncle was miserable 
about me : he had plainly seen, he knew and felt that 
something had come between us ! Alas, it was no 
fancy of his brain-troubled soul ! Whether I was in 
fault or not, there was that something ! It troubled 
the unity that had hitherto seemed a thing essential 
and indivisible ! 

Dared I go to him without a summons ? I knew 
Martha would call me the moment the doctor allowed 
her: it would not be right to go without that call. 
What I had to tell might justify far more anxiety than 
the sight of me would counteract. If I said nothing, 
the keen eye of his love would assure itself of the 


u8 the flight of the shadow. 

something hid in my silence, and he would not see 
that I was but waiting his improvement to tell him 
everything. I resolved, therefore, to remain where I 
was. 

The next two days were perhaps the most uncom- 
fortable ever I spent. A secret one desires to turn 
out of doors at the first opportunity, is not a pleasant 
companion. I do not say I was unhappy, still less 
that once I wished I had not seen John Day, but oh, 
how I longed to love him openly ! how I longed for 
my uncle’s sanction, without which our love could not 
be perfected ! Then, John’s mother was by no means 
a gladsome thought — except that he must be a good 
man indeed, who was good in spite of being unable to 
love, respect, or trust his mother ! The true notion of 
heaven is to be with everybody one loves : to him 
the presence of his mother — such as she was, that is 
— would destroy any heaven ! What a painful but 
salutary shock it will be to those whose existence is 
such a glorifying of themselves that they imagine their 
presence necessary to all about them, when they learn 
that their disappearance from the world sent a thrill 
of relief through the hearts of those nearest them ! 
To learn how little they were prized, will one day 
prove a strong medicine for souls self-absorbed. 

“There is nothing covered that shall not be re- 
vealed.” 


CHAPTER XVI. 


FAULT AND NO FAULT. 

The next day I kept the house till the evening, 
and then went walking in the garden in the twilight. 
Between the dark alleys and the open wilderness I 
flitted and wandered, alternating gloom and gleam 
outside me, even as they chased one another within me. 

In the wilderness I looked up — and there was 
John ! He stood outside the fence, just as I had seen 
him the night before, only now there was no aureole 
about his head : the moon had not yet reached the 
horizon. 

My first feeling was anger: he had broken our 
agreement ! I did not reflect that there was such a 
thing as breaking a law, or even a promise, and being 
blameless. He leaped the fence, and, clearing every 
bush like a deer, came straight toward me. It was no 
use trying to escape him. I turned my back, and stood. 
He stopped close behind me, a yard or two away. 

“ Will you not speak to me?” he said. “ It is not 
my fault I am come.” 


120 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“Whose fault then, pray ? ” I rejoined, with diffi- 
culty keeping my position. “ Is it mine ? ” 

“ My mother’s,” he answered. 

I turned and looked him in the eyes, through the 
dusk saw that he was troubled, ran to him, and put 
my arms about him. 

“ She has been spying,” he said, as soon as he 
could speak. “ She will part us at any risk, if she 
can. She is having us watched this very moment, 
most likely. She may be watching us herself. She is 
a terrible woman when she is for or against anything. 
Literally, I do not know what she would not do to get 
her own way. She lives for her own way. The loss 
of it would be to her as the loss of her soul. She will 
lose it this time though ! She will fail this time — if 
she never did before ! ” 

“ Well,” I returned, nowise inclined to take her 
part, “ I hope she will fail ! What does she say ? ” 

“ She says she would rather go to her grave than 
see me your husband.” 

“ Why?” 

“ Your family seems objectionable to her.” 

“ What is there against it ? ” 

“ Nothing that I know.” 

“ What is there against my uncle ? Is there any- 
thing against Martha Moon ? ” I was indignant at the 
idea of a whisper against either. “ What have / 


FAULT AND NO FAULT. 


121 


done ? ” I went on. “ We are all of the family I 
know : what is it ? ” 

“ I don’t think she has had time to invent anything 
yet ; but she pretends there is something, and says if 
I don’t give you up, if I don’t swear never to look at 
you again, she will tell it.” 

“What did you answer her ?” 

“ I said no power on earth should make me give 
you up. Whatever she knew, she could know nothing 
against you , and I was as ready to go to my grave as 
she was. ‘ Mother,’ I said, ‘ you may tell my determi- 
nation by your own ! Whether I marry her or not, 
you and I part company the day I come of age ; and 
if you speak word or do deed against one of her 
family, my lawyer shall look strictly into your ac- 
counts as my guardian.’ You see I knew where to 
touch her ! ” 

“ It is dreadful you should have to speak like that 
to your mother ! ” 

“It is; but you would feel to her just as I do if 
you knew all — though you wouldn’t speak so roughly, 
I know.” 

“ Can you guess what she has in her mind ?” 

“ Not in the least. She will pretend anything. It 
is enough that she is determined to part us. How, she 
cares nothing, so she succeed.” 

“ But she can not ! ” 


122 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ It rests with you.” 

“ How with me ? ” 

“ It will be war to the knife between her and me. 
If she succeed, it must be with you. I will do any- 
thing to foil her except lie.” 

“What if she should make you see it your duty to 
give me up ? ” 

“What if there were no difference between right 
and wrong ! We’re as good as married ! ” 

“Yes, of course; but I can not quite promise, you 
know, until I hear what my uncle will say.” 

“ If your uncle is half so good a man as you have 
made me think him, he will do what he can on our 
side. He loves what is fair; and what can be fairer 
than that those who love each other should marry ? ” 

I knew my uncle would not willingly interfere with 
my happiness, and for myself, I should never marry 
another than John Day — that was a thing of course: 
had he not kissed me ? But the best of lovers had 
been parted, and that which had been might be again, 
though I could not see how ! It was good, neverthe- 
less, to hear John talk! It was the right way for a 
lover to talk ! Still, he had no supremacy over what 
was to be ! 

“ Some would say it can not be so great a matter 
to us, when we have known each other such a little 
while ! ” I remarked. 


FAULT AND NO FAULT. 


123 


“ The true time is the long time ! ” he replied. 
“ Would it be a sign that our love was strong, that it 
took a great while to come to anything ? The strong- 
est things ” 

There he stopped, and I saw why : strongest things 
are not generally of quickest growth ! But there was 
the eucalyptus ! And was not St. Paul as good a 
Christian as any of them ? I said nothing, however : 
there was indeed no rule in the matter ! 

“ You must allow it possible,” I said, “that we may 
not be married ! ” 

“ I will not,” he answered. “ It is true my mother 
may get me brought in as incapable of managing my 
own affairs ; but — ” 

“ What mother would do such a wicked thing ! ” I 
cried. 

“My mother,” he answered. 

« Oh ! ” 

“ She would ! ” 

“ I can’t believe it.” 

“ I am sure of it.” 

I held my peace. I could not help a sense of dis- 
may at finding myself so near such a woman. I knew 
of bad women, but only in books : it would appear 
they were in other places as well! 

“ We must be on our guard,” he said. 

“ Against what ? ” 


124 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ I don’t know ; whatever she may do.” 

“We can’t do anything till she begins ! ” 

“ She has begun.” 

“ How ? ” I asked, incredulous. 

“ Leander is lame,” he answered. 

“ I am so sorry ! ” 

“ I am so angry ! ” 

“ Is it possible I understand you ? ” 

“ Quite. She did it.” 

“ How do you know ? ” 

“ I can no more prove it than I can doubt it. I 
can not inquire into my mother’s proceedings. I leave 
that sort of thing to her. Let her spy on me as she 
will, I am not going to spy on her.” 

“ Of course not ! But if you have no proof, how 
can you state the thing as a fact ? ” 

“ I have what is proof enough for saying it to my 
own soul.” 

“ But you have spoken of it to me ! ” 

“You are my better soul. If you are not, then I 
have done wrong in saying it to you.” 

I hastened to tell him I had only made him say 
what I hoped he meant — only I wasn’t his better soul. 
He wanted me then to promise that I would marry him 
in spite of any and every thing. I promised that I 
would never marry any one but him. I could not say 
more, I said, not knowing what my uncle might think, 


FAULT AND NO FAULT. 


125 


but so much it was only fair to say. For I had gone 
so far as to let him know distinctly that I loved him ; 
and what sort would that love be that could regard it 
as possible, at any distance of time, to marry another ! 
or what sort of woman could she be that would shrink 
from such a pledge! The mischief lies in promises 
made without forecasting thought. I knew what I 
was about. I saw forward and backward and all 
around me. A solitary education opens eyes that, in 
the midst of companions and engagements, are apt to 
remain shut. Knowledge of the world is no safeguard 
to man or woman. In the knowledge and love of 
truth lies our only safety. 

With that promise he had to be and was content. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


THE SUMMONS. 

Next morning the post brought me the following 
letter from my uncle. Whoever of my readers may 
care to enter into my feelings as I read, must imagine 
them for herself ; I will not attempt to describe them. 
The letter was not easy to read, as it was written in 
bed, and with his left hand. 

“ My little one, — I think I know more than you 
imagine. I think the secret flew into your heart of 
itself ; you did not take it up and put it there. I 
think you tried to drive it out, and it would not go : 
the same Fate that clips the thread of life, had clipped 
its wings that it could fly no more ! Did my little one 
think I had not a heart big enough to hold her secret ? 
1 wish it had not been so : it has made her suffer ! I 
pray my little one to be sure that I am all on her side; 
that my will is to do and contrive the best for her that 
lies in my power. Should I be unable to do what she 
would like, she must yet believe me true to her as to 
my God, less than whom only 1 love her : — less be- 


THE SUMMONS. 


127 

cause God is so much bigger, that so much more love 
will hang upon him. I love you, dear, more than any 
other creature except one, and that one is not in this 
world. Be sure that, whatever it may cost me, I will 
be to you what your own perfected soul will approve. 
Not to do my best for you, would be to be false, not 
to God only, but to your father as well, whom I loved 
and love dearly. Come to me, my child, and tell me 
all. I know you have done nothing wrong, nothing to 
be ashamed of. Some things are so difficult to tell, 
that it needs help to make way for them : I will help 
you. I am better. Come to me at once, and we will 
break the creature’s shell together, and see what it is 
like, the shy thing! — Your uncle.” 

I was so eager to go to him, that it was with diffi- 
culty I finished his letter before starting. Death had 
been sent home, and was in the stable, sorely missing 
his master. I called Dick, and told him to get ready 
to ride with me to Wittenage ; he must take Thanatos, 
and be at the door with Zoe in twenty minutes. 

We started. As we left the gate, I caught sight of 
John coming from the other direction, his eyes on the 
ground, lost in meditation. I stopped. He looked 
up, saw me, and was at my side in two moments. 

“ I have heard from my uncle,” I said. “ He wants 
me. I am going to him.” 

“ If only I had my horse ! ” he answered. 


i2 8 the flight of the shadow. 

“Why shouldn’t you take Thanatos?” I rejoined. 

“ No,” he answered, after a moment’s hesitation. 
“ It would be an impertinence. I will walk, and per- 
haps see you there. It’s only sixteen miles, I think. — 
What a splendid creature he is ! ” 

“ He’s getting into years now,” I replied ; “ but he 
has been in the stable several days, and I am doubtful 
whether Dick will feel quite at home on him.” 

“ Then your uncle would rather I rode him ! He 
knows I am no tailor! ” said John. 

“ How ? ” I asked. 

“ I don’t mean he knows who I am, but he saw me 
a fortnight ago, in one of our fields, giving Leander, 
who is but three, a lesson or two. He stopped and 
looked on for a good many minutes, and said a kind 
word about my handling of the horse. He will re- 
member, I am sure.” 

“ How glad I am he knows something of you ! 
If you don’t mind being seen with me, then, there is 
no reason why you should not give me your escort.” 

Dick was not sorry to dismount, and we rode away 
together, 

I was glad of this for one definite reason, as well 
as many indefinite : I wanted John to see my letter, 
and know what cause I had to love my uncle. I for- 
got for the moment my resolution not to meet him 
again before telling my uncle everything. Somehow 


THE SUMMONS. 


129 

he seemed to be going with me to receive my uncle’s 
approval. 

He read the letter, old Death carrying him all the 
time as gently as he carried myself — I often rode him 
now — and returned it with the tears in his eyes. For 
a moment or two he did not speak. Then he said in a 
very solemn way, 

“ I see ! I oughtn’t to have a chance if he be 
against me ! I understand now why I could not get 
you to promise ! — All right ! The Lord have mercy 
upon me ! ” 

“ That He will ! He is always having mercy upon 
us ! ” I answered, loving John and my uncle and God 
more than ever. I loved John for this especially, at 
the moment — that his nature remained uninjured to- 
ward others by his distrust of her who should have 
had the first claim on his confidence. I said to myself 
that, if a man had a bad mother, and yet was a good 
man, there could be no limit to the goodness he must 
come to. That he was a man after my uncle’s own 
heart, I had no longer the least doubt. Nor was it a 
small thing to me that he rode beautifully — never 
seeming to heed his horse, and yet in constant touch 
with him. 

We reached the town, and the inn where my uncle 
was lying. On the road we had arranged where he 
would be waiting me to hear what came next. He 
15 


130 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


went to see the horses put up, and I ran to find Mar- 
tha. She met me on the stair, and went straight to 
my uncle to tell him I was come, returned almost im- 
mediately, and led me to his room. 

I was shocked to see how pale and ill he looked. 
I feared, and was right in fearing, that anxiety about 
myself had not a little to do with his condition. His 
face brightened when he saw me, but his eyes gazed 
into mine with a searching inquiry. His face bright- 
ened yet more when he found his eager look answered 
by the smile which my perfect satisfaction inspired. I 
knelt by the bedside* afraid to touch him lest I should 
hurt his arm. 

Slowly he laid his left hand on my head, and I 
knew he blessed me silently. For a minute or two he 
lay still. 

“ Now tell me all about it,” he said at length, turn- 
ing his patient blue eyes on mine. 

I began at once, and if I did not tell him all, I let 
it be plain there was more of the sort behind, con- 
cerning which he might question me. When I had 
ended, 

“Is that everything?” he asked, with a smile so 
like all he had ever been to me, that my whole heart 
seemed to go out to meet it. 

“Yes, uncle,” I answered; ^1 think I may say so 
— except that I have not dwelt upon my feelings. 


THE SUMMONS. 


131 

Love, they say, is shy : and I fancy you will pardon 
me that portion.” 

“ Willingly, my child. More is quite unneces- 
sary.” 

“Then you know all about it, uncle?” I ventured. 
“ I was afraid you might not understand me. Could 
any one, do you think, that had not had the same ex- 
perience ? ” 

He made me no answer. I looked up. He was 
ghastly white ; his head had fallen back against the 
bed. I started up, hardly smothering a shriek. 

“ What is it, uncle ? ” I gasped. “ Shall I fetch 
Martha ? ” 

“ No, my child,” he answered, “ I shall be better 
in a moment. I am subject to little attacks of the 
heart, but they do not mean much. Give me some of 
that medicine on the table.” 

In a few minutes his color began to return, and 
the smile which was forced at first, gradually bright- 
ened until it was genuine. 

“ I will tell you the whole story one day,” he said, 
“ — whether in this world, I am doubtful. But when 
is nothing, or where , with eternity before us.” 

“ Yes, uncle,” I answered vaguely, as I knelt again 
by the bedside. 

“A person,” he said, after a while, slowly, and with 
hesitating effort, “ may look and feel a much better 


132 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


person at one time than at another. Upon occasion, 
he is so happy, or perhaps so well pleased with him- 
self, that the good in him comes all to the sur- 
face.” 

“ Would he be the better or the worse man if it did 
not, uncle ? ” I asked. 

“ You must not get me into a metaphysical discus- 
sion, little one,” he answered. “ We have something 
more important on our hands. I want you to note 
that, when a person is happy, he may look lovable ; 
whereas, things going as he does not like, another 
and very unfinished phase of his character may ap- 
pear.” 

“ Surely, everybody must know that, uncle ! ” 

“ Then you can hardly expect me to be confident 
that your new friend would appear as lovable if he 
were unhappy ? ” 

“ I have seen you, uncle, look as if nothing would 
ever make you smile again ; but I knew you loved me 
all the time.” 

“ Did you, my darling ? Then you were right. / 
dare not require of any man that he should be as 
good-tempered in trouble as out of it— though he 
must come to that at last ; but a man must be just , 
whatever mood he is in.” 

“ That is what I always knew you to be, uncle ! 
I never waited for a change in your looks, to tell you 


THE SUMMONS. 


133 

anything I wanted to tell you.— I know you, uncle!” 
I added, with a glow of still triumph. 

“ Thank you, little one!” he returned, half-play- 
fully, yet gravely. “All I want to say comes to this,” 
he resumed after a pause, “ that when a man is in 
love, you see only the best of him, or something better 
than he really is. Much good may be in a man, 
for God made him, and the man yet not be good, 
for he has done nothing, since his making, to make 
himself. Before you can say you know a man, you 
must have seen him in a few at least of his opposite 
moods. Therefore you can not wonder that I should 
desire a fuller assurance of this young man, than your 
testimony, founded on an acquaintance of three or four 
days, can give me.” 

“ Let me tell you, then, something that happened 
to-day,” I answered. “When first I asked him to 
come with me this morning, it was a temptation to 
him of course, not knowing when we might see each 
other again; but he hadn’t his own horse, and said it 
would be an impertinence to ride yours.” 

“ I hope you did not come alone ! ” 

“ Oh, no. I had set out with Dick, but John came 
after all.” 

“ Then his refusal to ride my horse does not come 
to much. It is a small thing to have good impulses, 
if temptation is too much for them.” 


134 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“But I haven’t done telling you, uncle! ” 

“ I am hasty, little one. I beg your pardon.” 

“ 1 have to tell you what made him give in to 
riding your horse. I confessed I was a little anxious 
lest Death, who had not been exercised for some 
days, should be too much for Dick. John said then 
he thought he might venture, for you had once 
spoken very kindly to him of the way he handled his 
own horse.” 

“ Oh, that’s the young fellow, is it ! ” cried my 
uncle, in a tone that could not be taken for other than 
one of pleasure. “That’s the fellow, is it?” he re- 
peated. “ H'm ! ” 

“ I hope you liked the look of him, uncle ! ” I said. 

“ The boy is a gentleman anyhow ! ” he answered. 
— You may think whether I was pleased ! — “ I never 
saw man carry himself better horseward ! ” he added 
with a smile 

“ Then you won’t object to his riding Death home 
again ? ” 

“ Not in the least ! ” he replied. “ The man can 
ride.” 

“ And may I go with him ? — that is, if you do not 
want me ! — I wish I could stay with you ! ” 

“ Rather than ride home with him ?” 

“Yes, indeed, if it were to be of use to you ! ” 

“ The only way you can be of use to me, is to ride 


THE SUMMONS. 


135 


home with Mr. Day, and not see him again until I 
have had a little talk with him. Tyranny may be a 
sense of duty, you know, little one ! ” 

“Tyranny, uncle!” I cried, as I laid my cheek on 
his hand, which was very cold. “ You could not make 
me think you a tyrant ! ” 

“ I should not like you to think me one, darling ! 
Still less would I like to deserve it, whether you 
thought me one or not ! But I could not be a tyrant 
to you if I would. You may defy me when you 
please.” 

“That would be to poison my own soul!” I 
answered. 

“ You must understand,” he continued, “ that I 
have no authority over you. If you were going to 
marry Mr. Day to-morrow, I should have no right to 
interfere. I am but a make-shift father to you, not 
a legal guardian.” 

“ Don’t cast me off, uncle ! ” I cried. “ You know 
I belong to you as much as if you were my very own 
father ! I am sure my father will say so when we 
see him. He will never come between you and 
me.” 

He gave a great sigh, and his face grew so intense 
that I felt as if I had no right to look on it. 

“ It is one of the deepest hopes of my existence,” 
he said, “ to give you back to him the best of daugh- 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


136 

ters. Be good, my darling, be good, even if you die of 
sorrow because of it.” 

The intensity had faded to a deep sadness, and 
there came a silence. 

“Would you like me to go now, uncle ?” I asked. 

“ I wish I could see Mr. Day at once,” he returned, 
“ but I am so far from strong, that I fear both weak- 
ness and injustice. Tell him I want very much to see 
him, and will let him know as soon as I am able.” 

“ Thank you, uncle ! He will be so glad ! Of 
course he can’t feel as I do, but he does feel that to 
do anything you did not like, would be just horrid.” 

“ And you will not see him again, little one, after 
he has taken you home, till I have had some talk with 
him?” 

“ Of course I will not, uncle.” 

I bade him good-by, had a few moments* conference 
with Martha, and found John at the place appointed. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


JOHN SEES SOMETHING. 

As we rode, I told him everything. It did not 
seem in the least strange that I should be so close to 
one of whom a few days before I had never heard ; it 
seemed as if all my life I had been waiting for him, 
and now he was come, and everything was only as it 
should be ! We were very quiet in our gladness. 
Some slight anxiety about my uncle’s decision, and 
the certain foreboding of trouble on the part of his 
mother, stilled us both, sending the delight of having 
found each other a little deeper and out of the way of 
the practical and reasoning. 

We did not urge our horses to their speed, but I 
felt that, for my uncle’s sake, I must not prolong the 
journey, forcing the last farthing of bliss from his 
generosity, while yet he was uncertain of his duty. 
The moon was rising just as we reached my home, 
and I was glad: John would have to walk miles to 
reach his, for he absolutely refused to take Death on, 
saying he did not know what might happen to him. 


138 THE flight of the shadow. 

As we stopped at the gate I bethought myself that 
neither of us had eaten since we left in the afternoon. 
I dismounted, and, leaving him with the horses, got 
what I could find for him, and then roused Dick, who 
was asleep. John confessed that, now I had made 
him think of it, he was hungry enough to eat anything 
less than an ox. We parted merrily, but when next 
we met, each confessed it had not been without a 
presentiment of impending danger. For my part, not- 
withstanding the position I had presumed to take with 
John when first he spoke of his mother, I was now as 
distrustful as he, and more afraid of her. 

Much the nearest way between the two houses lay 
across the heath. John walked along, eating the sup- 
per I had given him, and now and then casting a 
glance round the horizon. He had got about half- 
way, when, looking up, he thought he saw, dim in the 
ghosty light of the moon, a speck upon the track be- 
fore him. He said to himself it could hardly be any 
one on the moor at such a time of the night, and went 
on with his supper. Looking up again after an inter- 
val, he saw that the object was much larger, but hardly 
less vague, because of a light fog which had in the 
mean time risen. By and by, however, as they drew 
nearer to each other, a strange thrill of recognition 
went through him : on the way before him, which was 
little better than a footpath, and slowly approaching, 


JOHN SEES SOMETHING. 


139 


came what certainly could be neither the horse that 
had carried him that day, nor his double, but what 
was so like him in color, size, and bone, while so un- 
like him in muscle and bearing, that he might have 
been he, worn but for his skin to a skeleton. Straight 
down upon John he came, spectral through the fog, as 
if he were asleep, and saw nothing in his way. John 
stepped aside to let him pass, and then first looked in 
the face of his rider : with a shock of fear that struck 
him in the middle of the body, making him gasp and 
choke, he saw before him — so plainly that, but for the 
impossibility, he could have sworn to him in any court 
of justice — the man whom he knew to be at that mo- 
ment confined to his bed, twenty miles away, with a 
broken arm. Sole other human being within sight or 
sound in that still moonlight, on that desolate moor, 
the horseman never lifted his head, never raised his 
eyes to look at him. John stood stunned. He hardly 
doubted he saw an apparition. When at length he 
roused himself, and looked in the direction in which it 
went, it had all but vanished in the thickening white 
mist. 

He found the rest of his way home almost mechan- 
ically, and went straight to bed, but for a long time 
could not sleep. 

For what might not the apparition portend ? Mr. 
Whichcote lay hurt by a fall from his horse, and he 


140 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


had met his very image on the back of just such a 
horse, only turned to a skeleton ! Was he bearing him 
away to the tomb ? 

Then he remembered that the horse’s name was 
Death. 


CHAPTER XIX. 


JOHN IS TAKEN ILL. 

In the middle of the night he woke with a start, ill 
enough to feel that he was going to be worse. His 
head throbbed ; the room seemed turning round with 
him, and when it settled, he saw strange shapes in it. 
A few rays of the sinking moon had got in between 
the curtains of one of the windows, and had waked up 
everything ! The furniture looked odd — unpleasantly 
odd. Something unnatural, or at least unearthly, 
must be near him ! The room was an old-fashioned 
one, in thorough keeping with the age of the house — 
the very haunt for a ghost, but he had heard of no 
ghost in that room ! He got up to get himself some 
water, and drew the curtains aside. He could have 
been in no thralldom to an apprehensive imagination ; 
for what man, with a brooding terror couched in him, 
would, in the middle of the night, let in the moon ? 
To such a passion, she is worse than the deepest dark- 
ness, especially when going down, as she was then, 
with the weary look she gets by the time her work is 


142 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


about over, and she has long been forsaken of the 
poor mortals for whom she has so often to be up and 
shining all night. He poured himself some water and 
drank it, but thought it did not taste nice. Then he 
turned to the window, and looked out. 

The house was in a large park. Its few trees 
served mainly to show how wide the unbroken spaces 
of grass. Before the house, motionless as a statue, 
stood a great gray horse with hanging neck, his shad- 
ow stretched in mighty grotesque behind him, and on 
his back the very effigy of my uncle, motionless too as 
marble. The horse stood sidewise to the house, but 
the face of his rider was turned toward it, as if scan- 
ning its windows in the dying glitter of the moon. 
John thought he heard a cry somewhere, and went to 
his door, but, listening hard, heard nothing. When 
he looked again from the window, the apparition 
seemed fainter, and farther away, though neither 
horse nor rider had changed posture. He rubbed his 
eyes to see more plainly, could no longer distinguish 
the appearance, and went back to bed. In the morn- 
ing he was in a high fever — unconscious save of rest- 
less discomfort and undefined trouble. 

He learned afterward from the housekeeper that 
his mother herself nursed him, but he would take 
neither food nor medicine from her hand. No doctor 
was sent for. John thought, and I can not but think, 


JOHN IS TAKEN ILL. 


143 

that the water in his bottle had to do with his sudden 
illness. His mother may have merely wished to pre- 
vent him from coming to me; but, for the time at 
least, the conviction had got possession of him that 
she was attempting his life. He may have argued in 
semi-conscious moments, that she would not scruple to 
take again what she was capable of imagining she had 
given. Her attentions, however, may have arisen 
from alarm at seeing him worse than she had intended 
to make him, and desire to counteract what she had 
done. 

For several days he was prostrate with extreme 
exhaustion. Necessarily, I knew nothing of this; 
neither was I, notwithstanding my more than doubt 
of his mother, in any immediate dread of what she 
might do. The cessation of his visits could, of course, 
cause me no anxiety, seeing it was thoroughly under- 
stood between us that we were not at liberty to meet. 


CHAPTER XX. 


A STRANGE VISIT. 

On the fifth night after that on which he left me 
to walk home, I was roused, about two o’clock, by a 
sharp sound as of sudden hail against my window, 
ceasing as soon as it began. Wondering what it was, 
for hail it could hardly be, I sprang from the bed, 
pulled aside the curtain, and looked out. There was 
light enough in the moon to show me a man looking 
up at the window, and love enough in my heart to tell 
me who he was. How he knew the window mine, I 
have always forgotten to ask him. I would have 
drawn back, for it vexed me sorely to think him too 
weak to hold to our agreement, but the face I looked 
down upon was so ghastly and deathlike, that I per- 
ceived at once his coming must have its justification. 
I did not speak, for I would not have any in the house 
hear; but, putting on my shoes and a big cloak, I 
went softly down the stair, opened the door noiseless- 
ly, and ran to the other side of the house. There 
stood John, with his eyes fixed on my window. As I 


A STRANGE VISIT. 


145 


turned the corner I could see, by their weary flashing, 
that either something terrible had happened, or he 
was very ill. He stood motionless, unaware of my 
approach. 

“ What is it ? ” I said under my breath, putting a 
hand on his shoulder. 

He did not turn his head or answer me, but grew 
yet whiter, gasped, and seemed ready to fall. I put 
my arm round him, and his head sank on the top of 
mine. 

Whatever might be the matter, the first thing was 
to get him into the house, and make him lie down. I 
moved a little, holding him fast, and mechanically he 
followed his support ; so that, although with some dif- 
ficulty, I soon got him round the house, and into the 
great hall-kitchen, our usual sitting-room ; there was 
fire there that would only want rousing, and, warm as 
was the night, I felt him very cold. I let him sink on 
the wide sofa, covered him with my cloak, and ran to 
rouse old Penny. The aged sleep lightly, and she was 
up in an instant. I told her that a gentleman I knew 
had come to the house, either sleep-walking or deliri- 
ous, and she must come and help me with him. She 
struck a light, and followed me to the kitchen. 

John lay with his eyes closed, in a dead faint. We 
got him to swallow some brandy, and presently he 
came to himself a little. Then we put him in my warm 


146 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


bed, and covered him with blankets. In a minute or 
so he was fast asleep. He had not spoken a word. I 
left Penny to watch him, and went and dressed myself, 
thinking hard. The result was, that, having enjoined 
Penny to let no one near him, whoever it might be, I 
went to the stable, saddled Zoe, and set off for Wit- 
tenage. 

It was sixteen miles of a ride. The moon went 
down, and the last of my journey was very dark, for 
the night was cloudy ; but we arrived in safety, just as 
the dawn was promising to come as soon as it could. 
No one in the town seemed up, or thinking of getting 
up. I had learned a lesson from John, however, and 
I knew Martha’s window, which happily looked on the 
street. I got off Zoe, who was tired enough to stand 
still, for she was getting old and I had not spared her, 
and proceeded to search for a stone small enough to 
throw at the window. The scared face of Martha 
showed itself almost immediately. 

“It’s me!” I cried, no louder than she could just 
hear; “it’s me, Martha! Come down and let me in.” 

Without a word of reply, she left the window, and, 
after some fumbling with the lock, opened the door 
and came out to me, looking gray with scare, but none 
the less with all her wits to her hand. 

“ How is my uncle, Martha ? ” I said. 

“ Much better,” she answered. 


A STRANGE VISIT. 


147 


“ Then I must see him at once ! ” 

“ He’s fast asleep, child ! It would be a world’s 
pity to wake him ! ” 

“ It would be a worse pity not ! ” I returned. 

“ Very well : must-be must ! ” she answered. 

I made Zoe fast to the lamp-post : the night was 
warm, and, hot as she was, she would take no hurt. 
Then I followed Martha up the stair. 

But my uncle was awake. He had heard a little 
of our motions and whisperings, and lay in expecta- 
tion of something. 

“I thought I should hear from you soon!” he 
said. “ I wrote to Mr. Day on Thursday, but have 
had no reply. What has happened ? Nothing serious, 
I hope ? ” 

“ I hardly know, uncle. John Day is lying at our 
house unable to move or speak.” 

My uncle started up as if to spring from his bed, 
but fell back again with a groan. 

“Don’t be alarmed, uncle!” I said. “He is, I 
hope, safe for the moment, with Penny to watch him ; 
but I am very anxious Dr. Southwell should see 
him.” 

“ How did it come about, little one ? ” 

“ There has been no accident that I know of. But 
I scarcely know more than you,” I replied — and told 
him all that had taken place within my ken. 


148 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


He lay silent a moment, thinking. 

“ I can’t say I like his lying there with only Penny 
to protect him ! ” he said. “ He must have come 
seeking refuge ! I don’t like the thing at all ! He is 
in some danger we do not know ! ” 

“ I will go back at once, uncle,” I replied, and rose 
from the bedside, where I had seated myself a little 
tired. 

“You must, if we can not do better. But I think 
we can. Martha shall go, and you will stay with me. 
Run at once, and wake Dr. Southwell. Ask him to 
come directly.” 

I ran all the way — it was not far — and pulled the 
doctor’s night-bell. He answered it himself. I gave 
him my uncle’s message, and he was at the inn a few 
minutes after me. My uncle told him what had hap- 
pened, and begged him to go and see the patient, 
carrying Martha with him in his gig. 

The doctor said he would start at once. My un- 
cle begged him to give strictest orders that no one was 
to see Mr. Day, whoever it might be. Martha heard, 
and grew like a colonel of dragoons ordered to charge 
with his regiment. 

In less than half an hour they started — at a pace 
that delighted me. 

When Zoe was put up and attended to, and I was 
alone with my uncle, I got him some breakfast to 


A STRANGE VISIT. 


149 

make up for the loss of his sleep. He told me it was 
better than sleep to have me near him. 

What I went through that night and the following 
day, I need not recount. Whoever has loved one in 
danger and out of her reach, will know what it was like. 
The doctor did not make his appearance until five 
o’clock, having seen several patients on his way back. 
The young man, he reported, was certainly in for a fe- 
ver of some kind — he could not yet pronounce which. 
He would see him again on the morrow, he said, and 
by that time it would have declared itself. Some one 
in the neighborhood must watch the case ; it was impos- 
sible for him to give it sufficient attention. My uncle 
told him he was now quite equal to the task himself, 
and we would all go together the next day. My de- 
light at the proposal was almost equaled by my satis- 
faction that the doctor made no objection to it. 

For joy I scarcely slept that night : I was going to 
nurse John ! But I was anxious about my uncle. He 
assured me, however, that in one day more he would 
in any case have insisted on returning. If it had not 
been for a little lingering fever, he said, he would 
have gone much sooner. 

“ That was because of me, uncle ! ” I answered 
with contrition. 

“Perhaps,” he replied; “but I had a blow on the 
head, you know ! ” 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


150 

“There is one good thing,” I said : “you will know 
John the sooner from seeing him ill ! But perhaps 
you will count that only a mood, uncle, and not to be 
trusted ! ” 

He smiled. I think he was not very anxious about 
the result of a nearer acquaintance with John Day. I 
believe he had some faith in my spiritual instinct. 

Uncle went with the doctor in his brougham, and I 
rode Zoe. The back of the house came first in sight, 
and I saw the window-blinds of my room still down. 
The doctor had pronounced it the fittest for the inva- 
lid, and would not have him moved to the guest-cham- 
ber Penny had prepared for him. 

In the only room I liad ever occupied as my own, I 
nursed John for a space of three weeks. 

From the moment he saw me, he began to improve. 
My uncle noted this, and I fancy liked John the better 
for it. Nor did he fail to note the gentleness and 
gratitude of the invalid. 


CHAPTER XXI. 


A FOILED ATTEMPT. 

The morning after my uncle’s return, came a mes- 
senger from Rising with his lady’s compliments, ask- 
ing if Mr. Whichcote could tell her anything of her 
son : he had left the house unseen, during a feverish 
attack, and as she could get no tidings of him, she 
was in great anxiety. She had accidentally heard that 
he had made Mr. Whichcote’s acquaintance, and there- 
fore took the liberty of extending to him the inquiry 
she had already made everywhere else among his 
friends. My uncle wrote in answer, that her son had 
come to his house in a high fever ; that he had been 
under medical care ever since ; and that he hoped in 
a day or two he might be able to return. If he ex- 
pressed a desire to see his mother, he would immedi- 
ately let her know, but in the mean time it was im- 
perative he should be kept quiet. 

From this letter, Lady Cairnedge might surmise 
that her relations with her son were at least sus- 
pected. Within two hours came another message — 


152 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


that she would send a close carriage to bring him 
home the next day. Then indeed were my uncle and 
I glad that we had come. For though Martha would 
certainly have defended the citadel to her utmost, she 
might have been sorely put to it if his mother pro- 
ceeded to carry him away by force. My uncle, in re- 
ply, begged her not to give herself the useless trouble 
of sending to fetch him : in the state he was in at pres- 
ent, it would be tantamount to murder to remove 
him, and he would not be a party to it. 

When I yielded my place in the sick-room to Mar- 
tha and went to bed, my heart was not only at ease 
for the night, but I feared nothing for the next day 
with my uncle on my side — or rather on John’s side. 

We were just rising from our early dinner, for we 
were old-fashioned people, when up drove a grand 
carriage, with two strong footmen behind, and a serv- 
vant in plain clothes on the box by the coachman. It 
pulled up at the door, and the man on the box got 
down and rang the bell, while his fellows behind got 
down also, and stood together a little way behind him. 
My uncle at once went to the hall, but no more than 
in time, for there was Penny already on her way to 
open the door. He opened it himself, and stood on 
the threshold. 

“ If you please, sir,” said the man, not without 
arrogance, “ we’re come to take Mr. Day home.” 


A FOILED ATTEMPT. 


153 


“Tell your mistress,” returned my uncle, “that 
Mr. Day has expressed no desire to return, and is much 
too unwell to be informed of her ladyship’s wish.” 

“ Begging your pardon, sir,” said the man, “ we 
have her ladyship’s orders to bring him. We will take 
every possibly care of him. The carriage is an extra- 
easy one, and I’ll sit inside with the young gentleman 
myself. If he ain’t right in his head, he’ll never 
know nothink till he comes to himself in his own 
bed.” 

My uncle had let the man talk, but his anger was 
fast rising. 

“ I can not let him go. I would not send a beggar 
to the hospital in the state he is in.” 

“ But, indeed sir, you must ! We have our or- 
ders.” 

“ If you fancy I will dismiss a guest of mine at the 
order of any human being, were it the queen’s own 
majesty,” said my uncle — I heard the words, and with 
my mind’s eyes saw the blue flash of his as he said 
them — “ you will find yourself mistaken.” 

“I’m sorry,” said the man quietly, “but I have my 
orders! Let me pass, please. It is my business to 
find the young gentleman, and take him home. No 
one can have the right to keep him against his 
mother’s will, especially when he’s not in a fit state to 
judge for himself.” 


154 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Happily I am in a fit state to judge for him,” said 
my uncle, coldly. 

“ I dare not go back without him. Let me pass,” 
he returned, raising his voice a little, and approaching 
the door as if he would force his way. 

I ought to have mentioned that, as my uncle went 
to the door, he took from a rack in the hall a whip 
with a bamboo stock, which he generally carried when 
he rode. His answer to the man was a smart, though 
left-handed blow with the stock across his face : they 
were too near for the thong. He staggered back, and 
stood holding his hand to his face. His fellow-serv- 
ants, who, during the colloquy, had looked on with 
gentlemanlike imperturbability, made a simultaneous 
step forward. My uncle sent the thong with a hiss 
about their ears. They sprang toward him in a fury, 
but halted immediately and recoiled. He had drawn 
a small swordlike weapon, which I did not know to be 
there, from the stock of the whip. He gave one swift 
glance behind him. I was in the hall at his back. 

“ Shut the door, Orba,” he cried. 

I shut him out, and ran to a window in the little 
drawing-room, which commanded the door. Never 
had I seen him look as now — his pale face pale no 
longer, but flushed with anger. Neither, indeed, until 
that moment had I ever seen the natural look of anger, 
the expression of pure anger. There was nothing mean 


A FOILED ATTEMPT. 


155 

or ugly in it — not an atom of hate. But how his eyes 
blazed ! 

“ Go back,” he cried, in a voice far more stern than 
loud. “ If one of you set foot on the lowest step, I 
will run him through.” 

The men saw he meant it ; they saw the closed 
door, and my uncle with his back to it. They turned 
and spoke to each other. The coachman sat immov- 
able on his box. They mounted, and he drove away. 

I ran and opened the door. My uncle came in with 
a smile. He went up the stair, and I followed him to 
the room where the invalid lay. We were both anxious 
to learn if he had been disturbed. 

He was leaning on his elbow, listening. He looked 
a good deal more like himself. 

“ I knew you would defend me, sir ! ’ he said, with 
a respectful confidence which could not but please my 
uncle. 

“You did not want to go home — did you?” he 
asked with a smile. 

“I should have thrown myself out of the carriage! ” 
answered John ; “ — that is, if they had got me into it. 
But, please, tell me, sir,” he went on, “ how it is I find 
myself in your house ? I have been puzzling over it 
all the morning. I have no recollection of coming.” 

“You understand, I fancy,” rejoined my uncle, 
“ that one of the family has a notion she can take 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


156 

better care of you than anybody else ! Is not that 
enough to account for it ? ” 

“ Hardly, sir. Belorba can not have gone and res- 
cued me from my mother ! ” 

“ How do you know that ? Belorba is a terrible 
creature when she is roused. But you have talked 
enough. Shut your eyes, and don’t trouble yourself 
to recollect. As you get stronger, it will all come 
back to you. Then you will be able to tell us, instead 
of asking us to tell you.” 

He left us together. I quieted John by reading to 
him, and absolutely declining to talk. 

“You are a captive. The castle is enchanted: 
speak a single word,” I said, “and you will find your- 
self in the dungeon of your own room.” 

He looked at me an instant, closed his eyes, and in 
a few minutes was fast asleep. He slept for two hours, 
and when he woke was quite himself. He was very 
weak, but the fever was gone, and we had now only to 
feed him up, and keep him quiet. 


CHAPTER XXII. 


JOHN RECALLS AND REMEMBERS. 

What a weight was off my heart ! It seemed as if 
nothing more could go wrong. But, though John was 
plainly happy, he was not quite comfortable : he wor- 
ried himself with trying to remember how he had 
come to us. The last thing he could definitely recall 
before finding himself with us, was his mother looking 
at him through a night that seemed made of black- 
ness so solid that he marveled she could move in it. 
She brought him something to drink, but he fancied 
it blood, and would not touch it. He remembered 
now that there was a red tumbler in his room. He 
could recall nothing after, except a cold wind, and a 
sense of utter weariness but absolute compulsion : he 
must keep on and on till he found the gate of heaven, 
to which he seemed only forever coming nearer. His 
conclusion was that he knew what he was about every 
individual moment, but had no memory ; each thing 
he did was immediately forgotten, while the knowledge 
of what he had to do next remained with him. It 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


I 5 8 

was, he thought, a mental condition analogous with 
walking, in which every step is a frustrated fall. I set 
this down here, because, when I told my uncle what 
John had been saying, myself r_ot sure that I per- 
ceived what he meant, he declared the boy a philoso- 
pher of the finest grain. But he warned me not to 
encourage his talking, and especially not to ask him 
to explain. There was nothing, he said, worse for a 
weak brain, than to set a strong will to work it. 

I tried to obey him, but it grew harder as the days 
went on. There were not many of them, however; 
he recovered rapidly. When at length my uncle 
talked not only to but with him, I regarded it as a 
virtual withdrawal of his prohibition, and after that 
spoke to John of whatever came into his or my head. 

It was then he told me all he could remember 
since the moment he left me with his supper in his 
hand. A great part of his recollection was the vision 
of my uncle on the moor, and afterward in the park. 
We did not know what to make of it. I should at 
once have concluded it caused by prelusive illness, 
but from my remembrance of what both my uncle 
and myself had seen, so long before, in the thunder- 
storm; while John, willing enough to attribute its re- 
currence to that cause, found it impossible to concede 
that he was anything but well when crossing the moor. 
I thought, however, that excitement, fatigue, and lack 


JOHN RECALLS AND REMEMBERS. 


1 S9 


of food, might have something to do with it, and 
with his illness too ; while, if he was in a state to see 
anything phantasmal, what shape more likely to ap- 
pear than that of my uncle ! 

He would not hear of my mentioning the thing to 
my uncle. I would for my own part have gone to him 
with it immediately; but could not with John’s prayer 
in my ears. I resolved, however, to gain his con- 
sent if I could. 

He had by this time as great a respect for my 
uncle as I had myself, but could not feel at home 
with him as I did. Whether the vision was only a 
vision, or indeed my uncle’s double, whatever a double 
may be, the tale of it could hardly be an agreeable 
one to him; and naturally John shrank from the risk 
of causing him the least annoyance. 

The question of course came up, what he was to do 
when able to leave us. He had spoken very plainly 
to my uncle concerning his relations with his mother 
— had told him indeed that he could not help suspect- 
ing he owed his illness to her. 

I was nearly always present when they talked, but 
remember in especial a part of what passed on one 
occasion. 

“ I believe I understand my mother,” said John, 
“ — but only after much thinking. I loved her when a 
child ; and if she had not left me for the sake of 


i6o 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


liberty and influence — that at least is how I account 
for her doing so — I might at this moment be strug- 
gling for personal freedom, instead of having that 
over.” 

“ There are women,” returned my uncle, “ some 
of them of the most admired, who are slaves to 
a demoniacal love of power. The very pleasure of 
their consciousness consists in the knowledge that 
they have power — not power to do things, but power 
to make other people do things. It is an insanity, 
but a devilishly immoral and hateful insanity. — I do 
not say the lady in question is one of such, for I do 
not know her; I only say I have known such a one.” 

John replied that certainly the love of power was 
his mother’s special weakness. She was spoiled when 
a child, he had been told ; had her every wish regard- 
ed, her every whim respected. This ruinous treatment 
sprang, he said, from the self-same ambition, in an- 
other form, on the part of her mother — the longing, 
namely, to secure her child’s supreme affection — with 
the natural consequence that they came to hate one 
another. His father and she had been married but 
fifteen months, when he died of a fall, following the 
hounds. Within six months she was engaged, but the 
engagement was broken off, and she went abroad, 
leaving him behind her. She married Lord Cairnedge 
in Venice, and returned to England when John was 


JOHN RECALLS AND REMEMBERS. 161 

nearly four, and seemed to have lost all memory of 
her. His stepfather was good to him, but died when 
he was about eight. His mother was very severe. 
Her object plainly was to plant her authority so in 
his very nature that he should never think of dispute 
ing her will. 

“But,” said John, “she killed my love, and so I 
grew able to cast off her yoke.” 

“ The world would fare worse, I fancy,” remarked 
my uncle, “ if violent women bore patient children. 
The evil would become irremediable. The children 
might not be ruined, but they would bring no dis- 
cipline to the mother ! ” 

“Her servants,” continued John, “obey her im- 
plicitly, except when they are sure she will never 
know. She treats them so imperiously that they ad- 
mire her, and are proud to have such a mistress. But 
she is convinced at last, I believe, that she will never 
get me to do as she pleases ; and therefore hates me 
so heartily, that she can hardly keep her ladylike 
hands off me. I do not think I have been unreason- 
able ; I have not found it difficult to obey others that 
were set over me ; but when I found almost her every 
requirement part of a system for reducing me to a 
slavish obedience, I began to lay down lines of my 
own. I resolved to do at once whatever she asked 

me, whether pleasant to me or not, so long as I saw 
16 


x 62 the flight of the shadow. 

no reason why it should not be done. Then I was 
surprised to find how seldom I had to make a stand 
against her wishes. At the same time, the mode in 
which she conveyed her pleasure was invariably such 
as to make a pretty strong effort of the will necessary 
for compliance with it. But the effort to overcome 
the difficulty caused by her manner, helped to develop 
in me the strength to resist where it was not right to 
yield. By far the most serious difference we had yet 
had, arose about six months ago, when she insisted I 
should make myself agreeable to a certain lady, whom 
I by no means disliked. She had planned our mar- 
riage, 1 believe, as one of her parallels in the siege of 
the lady’s noble father, then a widower of a year. I 
told her I would not lay myself out to please any 
lady, except I wanted to marry her. ‘ And why, pray, 
should you not marry her ? ’ she returned. I answered 
that I did not love her, and would not marry until I 
saw the woman I could not be happy without, and she 
accepted me. She went into a terrible passion, but I 
found myself quite unmoved by it : it is a wonderful 
heartener to know yourself not merely standing up for 
a right, but for the right to do the right thing ! ‘ You 

wouldn’t surely have me marry a woman I didn’t care 
a straw for ! ’ I said. ‘ Quench my soul ! ’ she cried — 
I have often wondered where she learned the oath — 
‘what would that matter ? She wouldn’t care a straw 


JOHN RECALLS AND REMEMBERS, ^3 

for you in a month ? ’ — ‘ Why should I marry her 
then ? ’ — ‘ Because your mother wishes it,’ she replied, 
and turned to march from the room as if that settled 
the thing. But I could not leave it so. The sooner 
she understood, the better ? ‘ Mother ! ’ I cried, * I will 
not marry the lady. I will not pay her the least atten- 
tion that could be mistaken to mean the possibility of 
it.’ She turned upon me. I have just respect enough 
left for her, not to say what her face suggested to me. 
She was pale as a corpse; her very lips were colorless; 
her eyes — but I will not go on. * Your father all over ! * 
she snarled — yes, snarled, with an inarticulate cry 
of fiercest loathing, and turned again and went. 
If I do not quite think my mother, at present , 
would murder me, I do think she would do anything 
short of murder to gain her ends with me. But do 
not be afraid ; I am sufficiently afraid to be on my 
guard. 

“ My father was a rich man, and left my mother 
more than enough ; there was no occasion for her to 
marry again, except she loved, and I am sure she did 
not love Lord Cairnedge. I wish, for my sake, not for 
his, he were alive now. But the moment I am one and 
twenty I shall be my own master, and hope, sir, you 
will not count me unworthy to be the more Belorba’s, 
servant. One thing I am determined upon : my moth- 
er shall not cross my threshold but at my wife’s in- 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


164 

vitation ; and I shall never ask my wife to invite her. 
She is too dangerous. 

“We had another altercation about Miss Miles, 
an hour or two before I first saw Orba. They were 
far from worthy feelings that possessed me up to the 
moment when I caught sight of her over the wall. It 
was a leap out of hell into paradise. The glimpse of 
such a face, without shadow of scheme or plan or self- 
ish end, was salvation to me. I thank God ! ” 

Perhaps I ought not to let those words about my- 
self stand, but he said them. 

He had talked too long. He fell back in his chair, 
and the tears began to gather in his eyes. My uncle 
rose, put his arm about me, and led me to the study. 

“ Let him rest a bit, little one,” he said as we en- 
tered. “ It is long since we had a good talk ! ” 

He seated himself in his think-chair — a name 
which, when a child, I had given it, and I slid to the 
floor at his feet. 

“ I can not help thinking, little one,” he began, 
“ that you are going to be a happy woman ! I do 
believe that is a man to be trusted. As for the mother, 
there is no occasion to think of her, beyond being on 
your guard against her. You will have no trouble with 
her after you are married.’' 

“ I can not help fearing she will do us a mischief, 
uncle,” I returned. 


JOHN RECALLS AND REMEMBERS. 


165 

“ Sir Philip Sidney says — ‘ Since a man is bound no 
further to himself than to do wisely, chance is only to 
trouble them that stand upon chance.’ That is, we 
are responsible only for our actions, not for their re- 
sults. Trust first in God, then in John Day.” 

“ I was sure you would like him, uncle ! ” I cried, 
with a flutter of loving triumph. 

“ I was nearly as sure myself — such confidence had 
I in the instinct of my little one. I think that I, of 
the two of us, may, in this instance, claim the greater 
faith ! ” 

“You are always before me, uncle!” I said. “I 
only follow where you lead. But what do you think 
the woman will do next ? ” 

“ I don’t think. It is no use. We shall hear of her 
before long. If all mothers were like her, the world 
would hardly be saved ! ” 

“ It would not be worth saving, uncle.” 

“ Whatever can be saved, must be worth saving, my 
child.” 

“Yes, uncle; I shouldn’t have said that,” I re- 
plied. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 


LETTER AND ANSWER. 

We did hear of her before long. The next morn- 
ing a letter was handed to my uncle as we sat at 
breakfast. He looked hard at the address, changed 
countenance, and frowned very dark, but I could not 
read the frown. Then his face cleared a little; he 
opened, read, and handed the letter to me. 

Lady Cairnedge hoped Mr. Whichcote would excuse 
one who had so lately come to the neighborhood, that, 
until an hour ago, she knew nothing of the position 
and character of the gentleman in whose house her son 
had, in a momentary, but, alas! not unusual aberra- 
tion, sought shelter, and found generous hospitality. 
She apologized heartily for the unceremonious way in 
which she had sent for him. In her anxiety to have 
him home, if possible, before he should realize his 
awkward position in the house of a stranger, she had 
been inconsiderate ! She left it to the judgment of his 
kind host whether she should herself come to fetch 
him, or send her carriage with the medical man who 


LETTER AND ANSWER. 


167 

usually attended him. In either case her servants 
must accompany the carriage, as he would probably 
object to being removed. He might, however, be per- 
fectly manageable, for he was, when himself, the gen- 
tlest creature in the world ! 

I was in a rage. I looked up, expecting to see my 
uncle as indignant with the diabolical woman as I was 
myself. But he seemed sunk in reverie, his body pres- 
ent, his spirit far away. A pang shot through my 
heart. Could the wicked device have told already? 

“ May I ask, uncle,” I said, and tried hard to keep 
my voice steady, “ how you mean to answer this vile 
epistle ? ” 

He looked up with a wan smile, such as might have 
broke from Lazarus when he found himself again in 
his body. 

“ I will take it to the young man,” he answered. 

“ Please, let us go at once then, uncle ! I can not 
sit still.” 

He rose, and we went together to John’s room. 

He was much better — sitting up in bed, and eating 
the breakfast Penny had carried him. 

“ I have just had a letter from your mother, Day,” 
said my uncle. 

“ Indeed ! ” returned John dryly. 

“ Will you read it, and tell me what answer you 
would like me to return.” 


i68 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Hardly like her usual writing — though there’s her 
own strange S ! ” remarked John as he looked at it. 

“ Does she always make an S like that ? ” asked my 
uncle, with something peculiar in his tone, I thought. 

“Always — like a snake just going to strike.” 

My uncle’s face grew ghastly pale. He almost 
snatched the letter from John’s hand, looked at it, 
gave it back to him, and, to our dismay, left the room. 

“What can be the matter, John ?” I said, my heart 
sinking within me. 

“ Go to him,” said John. 

I dared not. I had often seen him like that before 
walking out into the night ; but there was something 
in his face now which I had not seen there before. It 
looked as if some terrible suspicion were suddenly 
confirmed. 

“You see what my mother is after!” said John. 
“You have now to believe her, that I am subject to 
fits of insanity, or to believe me, that there is nothing 
she will not do to get her way.” 

“ Her object is clear,” I replied. “ But if she 
thinks to fool my uncle, she will find herself mis- 
taken ! ” 

“ She hopes to fool both you and your uncle,” he 
rejoined. “ The only wise thing I could do, she will 
handle so as to convince any expert of my madness — 
I mean, my coming to you ! My reasons will go for 


LETTER AND ANSWER. 


169 

nothing — less than nothing — with any one she chooses 
to bewitch. She will look at me with an anxious love 
no doctor could doubt. No one can know — you do 
not know that I am not mad — or at least subject to 
attacks of madness ! ” 

“Oh, John, don’t frighten me ! ” I cried. 

“ There ! you are not sure about it ! ” 

It seemed cruel of him to tease me so ; but I saw 
presently why he did it : he thought his mother’s 
letter had waked a doubt in my uncle ; and he wanted 
me not to be vexed with my uncle, even if he deserted 
him and went over to his mother’s side. 

“I love your uncle,” he said. “I know he is a 
true man ! I will not be angry with him if my mother 
do mislead him. The time will come when he will 
know the truth. It must appear at last ! I shall have 
to fight her alone, that’s all ! The worst is, if he 
thinks with my mother I shall have to go at once ! — 
If only somebody would sell my horse for me ! ” 

I guessed that his mother kept him short of money, 
and remembered with gladness that I was not quite 
penniless at that moment. 

“ In the mean time, you must keep as quiet as you 
can, John,” I said. “ Where is the good of planning 
upon an if 2 To trust is to get ready, uncle says. 
Trust is better than foresight.” 

John required little such persuading. And indeed 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


170 

something very different was in my uncle’s mind from 
what John feared. 

Presently I caught a glimpse of him riding out of 
the yard. I ran to a window from which I could see 
the edge of the moor, and saw him cross it at an up- 
hill gallop. 

He was gone about four hours, and on his return 
went straight to his own room. Not until nine o’clock 
did I go to him, and then he came with me to supper. 

He looked worn, but was kind and genial as usual. 
After supper he sent for Dick, and told him to ride to 
Rising, the first thing in the morning, with a letter he 
would find on the hall-table. 

The letter he read to us before we parted for the 
night. It was all we could have wished. He wrote 
that he must not have any one in his house interfered 
with ; so long as a man was his guest, he was his serv- 
ant. Her ladyship had, however, a perfect right to 
see her son, and would be welcome ; only the decision 
as to his going or remaining must rest with the young 
man himself. If he chose to accompany his mother, 
well and good ! though he should be sorry to lose 
him. If he declined to return with her, he and his 
house continued at his service. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 


HAND TO HAND. 

We looked for Lady Cairnedge all the next day. 
John was up by noon, and ready to receive her in the 
drawing-room ; he would not see her in his bedroom. 
But the hours passed, and she did not come. 

In the evening, however, when the twilight was 
thickening, and already all was dark in the alleys of 
the garden, her carriage drove quietly up — with a 
startling scramble of arrest at the door. The same 
servants were outside, and a very handsome dame 
within. As she descended, I saw that she was tall, 
and, if rather stout, not stouter than suited her age 
and style. Her face was pale, but she seemed in per- 
fect health. When I saw her closer, I found her feat- 
ures the most regular I had ever seen. Had the soul 
within it filled the mold of that face, it would have 
been beautiful. As it was, it was only handsome — to 
me repulsive. The moment I saw it, I knew myself in 
the presence of a masked battery. 

My uncle had insisted that she should be received 


172 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


where we usually sat, and had given Penny orders to 
show her into the hall-kitchen. 

I was alone there, preparing something for John. 
We were not expecting her, for it seemed now too late 
to look for her. My uncle was in the study, and 
Martha somewhere about the house. My heart sank 
as I turned from the window, and sank yet lower 
when she appeared in the doorway of the kitchen, but 
as I advanced, I caught sight of my uncle, and went 
boldly to meet the enemy. He had come down his 
stair, and had just stepped into a clear blaze of light, 
which that moment burst from the wood I had some 
time ago laid damp upon the fire. The next instant I 
saw the lady’s countenance ghastly with terror, look- 
ing beyond me. I turned, but saw nothing, save that 
my uncle had disappeared. When I faced her again, 
only a shadow of her fright remained. I offered her 
my hand — for she was John’s mother — but she did not 
take it. She stood scanning me from head to foot. 

“ I am Lady Cairnedge,” she said. “ Where is my 
son?” 

I turned yet again. My uncle had not come back. 
I was not prepared to take his part. I was bewil- 
dered. A dead silence fell. For the first time in my 
life, my uncle seemed to have deserted me, and at the 
moment when most I needed him ! I turned once 
more to the lady, and said, hardly knowing what, 


HAND TO HAND. 


173 


“ You wish to see Mr. Day ? ” 

She answered me with a cold stare. 

“ I will go and tell him you are here,” I faltered ; 
and passing her, I sped along the passage to the 
drawing-room. 

“John!” I cried, bursting in, “ she’s come ! Do 
you still mean to see her ? Are you able ? Un- 
cle—” 

There I stopped, for his eyes were stern, and not 
looking at me, but at something behind me. One 
moment I thought his fever had returned, but follow- 
ing his gaze I looked round: — there stood Lady 
Cairnedge ! John was face to face with his mother, 
and my uncle was not there to defend him ! 

“ Are you ready ? ” she said, nor pretended greet- 
ing. She seemed slightly discomposed, and in haste. 

I was by this time well aware of my lover’s deter- 
mination of character, but I was not prepared for the 
tone in which he addressed the icy woman calling her- 
self his mother. 

“ I am ready to listen,” he answered. 

“ John ! ” she returned, with mingled severity and 
sharpness, “let us have no masquerading! You are 
perfectly fit to come home, and you must come at 
once The carriage is at the door.” 

“You are quite right, mother,” answered John 
calmly ; “ I am fit to go home with you. But Rising 


174 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


does not quite agree with me. I dread such another 
attack, and do not mean to go.” 

The drawing-room had a rectangular bay-window, 
one of whose three sides commanded the door. The 
opposite side looked into a little grove of larches. 
Lady Cairnedge had already realized the position of 
the room. She darted to the window, and saw her 
carriage but a few yards away. 

She would have thrown up the sash, but found she 
could not. She twisted her handkerchief round her 
gloved hand, and dashed it through a pane. 

“ Men 1 ” she cried, in a loud, commanding voice, 
“come at once.” 

The moment she went to the window, I sprang to 
the door, locked it, put the key in my pocket, and set 
my back to the door. 

I heard the men thundering at the hall-door. Lady 
Cairnedge turned as if she would herself go and open 
to them, but seeing me she understood what I had 
done, and went back to the window. 

“ Come here ! Come to me here — to the window ! ” 
she cried. 

John had been watching with a calm, determined 
look. He came and stood between us. 

“John,” I said, “leave your mother to me.” 

“ She will kill you ! ” he answered. 

“ You might kill her ! ” I replied. 


HAND TO HAND. 


*75 


I darted to the chimney, where a clear fire was 
burning, caught up the poker, and thrust it between 
the bars. 

“That’s for you!” I whispered. “They will not 
touch you with that in your hand ! Never mind me. 
If your mother move hand or foot to help them, it 
will be my turn ! ” 

He gave me a smile and a nod, and his eyes light- 
ened. I saw that he trusted me, and I felt fearless as 
a bull-dog. 

In the mean time, she had spoken to her servants, 
and was now trying to open the window, which had a 
peculiar catch. I saw that John could defend himself 
much better at the window than in the room. I went 
softly behind his mother, put my hands round her 
neck, and, clasping them in front, pulled her backward 
with all my strength. We fell on the floor together, I 
under of course, but clutching as if all my soul were 
in my fingers. Neither should she meddle with John, 
nor should he lay hand on her ! I did not mind much 
what I did to her myself. 

“ To the window, John,” I cried, “and break their 
heads ! ” 

He snatched the poker from the fire, and the next 
moment I heard a crashing of glass, but of course I 
could not see what was going on. Mine was no grand 
way of fighting, but what was dignity where John was 


176 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


in danger ! For the moment I had the advantage, but, 
while determined to hold on to the last, I feared she 
would get the better of me, for she was much bigger 
and stronger, and crushed and kicked, and dug her 
elbows into me, struggling like a mad woman. 

All at once the tug of her hands on mine ceased. 
She gave a great shriek, and I felt a shudder go 
through her. Then she lay still. I relaxed my hold 
cautiously, for I feared a trick. She did not move. 
Horror seized me; I thought I had killed her. I 

writhed from under her to see. As I did so I caught 

sight of the pale face of my uncle, looking in at the 
part of the window next the larch-grove. Immedi- 
ately I remembered Lady Cairnedge’s terror in the 
kitchen, and knew that the cause of it, and of her 

present cry, must be the same, to wit, the sight of my 

uncle. I had not hurt her ! I was not yet on my feet 
when my uncle left the window, flew to the other side 
of it, and fell upon the men with a stick so furiously 
that he drove them to the carriage. The horses took 
fright, and went prancing about, rearing and jibbing. 
At the call of the coachman, two of the men flew to 
their heads. I saw no more of their assailant. 

John, who had not got a fair blow at one of his be- 
siegers, left the window, and came to me where I was 
trying to restore his mother. The third man, the but- 
ler, came back to the window, put his hand through, 


HAND TO HAND. 


1 77 


undid the catch, and flung the sash wide. John 
caught up the poker from the floor and darted to it. 

“ Set foot within the window, Parker,” he cried, 
“ and I will break your head.” 

The man did not believe he would hurt him, and 
put foot and head through the window. 

Now John had honestly threatened, but to perform 
he found harder than he had thought : it is one 
thing to raise a poker, and another to strike a head 
With it. The window was narrow, and the whole man 
Was not yet in the room, when John raised his weapon ; 
but he could not bring the horrid poker down upon 
the dumb blind back of the stooping man’s head. He 
threw it from him, and casting his eyes about, spied a 
huge family Bible on a side-table. He sprang to it, 
and caught it up — just in time. The man had got one 
foot firm on the floor, and was slowly drawing in the 
other, when down came the bible on his head, with 
all the force John could add to its weight. The but- 
ler tumbled senseless on the floor. 

“ Here, Orbie ! ” cried John ; “ help me to bundle 
him out before he comes to himself. — Take what you 
would have ! ” he said, as between us we shoved him 
out on the gravel. 

I fetched smelling-salts and brandy, and every- 
thing I could think of — fetched Martha too, and be- 
tween us we got her on the sofa, but Lady Cairn- 


i7» 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


edge lay motionless. She breathed indeed, but did 
not open her eyes. John stood ready to do anything 
for her, but his countenance revealed little compas- 
sion. Whatever the cause of his mother’s swoon — he 
had never seen her in one before — he was certain it 
had to do with some bad passage in her life. He said 
so to me that same evening. “ But what could the 
sight of my uncle have to do with it?” I asked. 
“ Probably he knows something, or she thinks he 
does,” he answered. 

“ Wouldn’t it be better to put her to bed, and send 
for the doctor, John ?” I suggested at last. 

Perhaps the sound of my voice calling her son by 
his Christian name, stung her proud ear, for the same 
moment she sat up, passed her hands over her eyes, 
and cast a scared gaze about the room. 

“ Where am I ? Is it gone ? ” she murmured, look- 
ing ghastly. 

No one answered her. 

“ Call Parker,” she said, feebly, yet imperiously. 

Still no one spoke. 

She kept glancing sideways at the window, where 
nothing was to be seen but the gathering night. In a 
few moments she rose and walked straight from the 
room, erect, but white as a corpse. I followed, passed 
her, and opened the hall-door. There stood the car- 
riage, waiting, as if nothing unusual had happened, 


HAND TO HAND. 


1 79 

Parker seated in the rumble, with one of the footmen 
beside him. The other man stood by the carriage- 
door. He opened it immediately ; her ladyship stepped 
in, and dropped on the seat; the carriage rolled away. 

I went back to John. 

“ I must leave you, darling ! ” he said. “ I can not 
subject you to the risk of such another outrage! I 
fear sometimes my mother may be what she would 
have you think me. I ought to have said, I hope she 
is. It would be the only possible excuse for her be- 
havior. The natural end of loving one’s own way, is 
to go mad. If. you don’t get it, you go mad ; if you 
do get it, you go madder — that’s all the difference ! — 
I must go ! ” 

I tried to expostulate with him, but it was of no 
use. 

“ Where will you go ? ” I said. “ You can not go 
home ! ” 

“ I would at once,” he answered, “ if I could take 
the reins in my own hands. But I will go to London, 
and see the family-lawyer. He will tell me what I 
had better do.” 

“ You have no money ! ” I said. 

‘‘How do you know that?” he returned with a 
smile. “ Have you been searching my pockets ? ” 

“ John ! ” I cried. 

He broke into a merry laugh. 


i8o 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Your uncle will lend me a five-pound-note,” he 
said. 

“He will lend you as much as you want; but I 
don’t think he’s in the house,” I answered. “ I have 
two myself, though! I’ll run and fetch them.” 

I bounded away to get the notes. It was like hav- 
ing a common purse already, to lend John ten pounds ! 
But I had no intention of letting him leave the house 
the same day he was first out of his room after such 
an illness — that was, if I could help it. 

My uncle had given me the use of a drawer in that 
same cabinet in which were the precious stones ; and 
there, partly, I think, from the pride of sharing the 
cabinet with my uncle, I had long kept everything I 
counted precious; I should have kept Zoe there if she 
had not been alive and too big ! 


CHAPTER XXV. 


A VERY STRANGE THING. 

The moment I opened the door of the study, I saw 
my uncle — in his think-chair, his head against the back 
of it, his face turned to the ceiling. I ran to his side 
and dropped on my knees, thinking he was dead. He 
opened his eyes and looked at me, but with such a 
wan, woe-begone countenance, that I burst into a pas- 
sion of tears. 

“What is it, uncle dear?” I gasped and sobbed. 

“ Nothing very new, little one,” he answered. 

“ It is something terrible, uncle,” I cried, “ or you 
would not look like that ! Did those horrid men hurt 
you ? You did give it them well ! You came down on 
them like the angel on the Assyrians ! ” 

“ I don’t know what you’re talking about, little 
one ! ” he returned. “ What men ? ” 

“The men that came with John’s mother to carry 
him off. If it hadn’t been for my beautiful uncle, 
they would have done it too ! How I wondered what 
had become of you ! I was almost in despair. I 


182 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


thought you had left us to ourselves — and you only 
waiting, like God, for the right moment ! ” 

He sat up, and stared at me, bewildered. 

‘‘I had forgotten all about John !” he said. “As 
to what you think I did, 1 know nothing about it. I 
haven’t been out of this room since I saw — that specter 
in the kitchen.” 

“John’s mother, you mean, uncle?” 

“Ah! she’s John’s mother, is she? Yes, I thought 
as much — and it was more than my poor brain could 
stand! It was too terrible! — My little one, this is 
death to you and me ! ” 

My heart sank within me. One thought only 
went through my head — that, come what might, I 
would no more give up John, than if I were already 
married to him in the church. 

“ But why — what is it, uncle ? ” I said, hardly able 
to get the words out. 

“ I will tell you another time,” he answered, and 
rising, went to the door. 

“John is going to London,” I said, following him. 

“Is he?” he returned listlessly. 

“ He wants to see his lawyer, and try to get things 
on a footing of some sort between his mother and him.” 

“ That is very proper,” he replied, with his hand on 
the lock. 

“ But you don’t think it would be safe for him to 


A VERY STRANGE THING. ^3 

travel to-night — do you, uncle — so soon after his ill- 
ness ?” I asked. 

“No, I can not say I do. It would not be safe. 
He is welcome to stop till to-morrow.” 

“ Will you not tell him so, uncle ? He is bent on 
going!” 

“ I would rather not see him ! There is no occa- 
sion. It will be a great relief to me when he is able — 
quite able, I mean — to go home to his mother — or 
where it may suit him best.” 

It was indeed like death to hear my uncle talk so 
differently about John. What had he done to be 
treated in this way — taken up and made a friend of, 
and then cast off without reason given ! My dear 
uncle was not at all like himself! To say he forgot 
our trouble and danger, and never came near us in 
our sore peril, when we owed our deliverance to him ! 
and now to speak like this concerning John ! Some- 
thing was terribly wrong with him ! I dared hardly 
think what it could be. 

I stood speechless. 

My uncle opened the door, and went down the 
steps. The sound of his feet along the corridor and 
down the stair to the kitchen, died away in my ears. 
My life seemed to go ebbing with it. I was stranded 
on a desert shore, and he in whom I had trusted was 
leaving me there ! 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


184 

I came to myself a little, got the two five-pound- 
notes, and returned to John. 

When I reached the door of the room, I found my 
heart in my throat, and my brains upside down. What 
was I to say to him ? How could I let him go away 
so late ? and how could I let him stay where his de- 
parture would be a relief? Even I would have him 
gone from where he was not wanted ! I saw, how- 
ever, that my uncle must not have John’s death at his 
door — that I must persuade him to stay the night. I 
went in, and gave him the notes, but begged him, for 
my love, to go to bed. In the morning, I said, I 
would drive him to the station. 

He yielded with difficulty — but with how little sus- 
picion that all the time I wished him gone ! I went to 
bed only to lie listening for my uncle's return. It was 
long past midnight ere he came. 

In the morning I sent Penny to order the phaeton, 
and then ran to my uncle’s room, in the hope he would 
want to see John before he left: I was not sure he 
had realized that he was going. 

He was neither in his bed-room nor in the study. 
I went to the stable. Dick was putting the horse to 
the phaeton. He told me he had heard his master, 
two hours before, saddle Thanatos, and ride away. 
This made me yet more anxious about him. He did 
not often ride out early — seldom indeed after coming 


A VERY STRANGE THING. 185 

home late ! Things seemed to threaten complica- 
tion ! 

John looked so much better, and was so eager 
after the projected interview with his lawyer, that I 
felt comforted concerning him I did not tell him 
what my uncle had said the night before. It would, I 
felt, be wrong to mention what my uncle might wish 
forgotten ; and as I did not know what he meant, it 
could serve no end. We parted at the station very 
much as if we had been married half a century, and I re- 
turned home to brood over the strange things that had 
happened. But before long I found myself in a welter- 
ing swamp of futile speculation, and turned my thoughts 
perforce into other channels, lest I should lose the power 
of thinking, and be drowned in reverie : my uncle had 
taught me that reverie is Phaeton in the chariot of Apollo. 

The weary hours passed, and my uncle did not 
come. I had never before been really uneasy at his 
longest absence; but now I was far more anxious 
about him than about John. Alas, through me fresh 
trouble had befallen my uncle as well as John ! When 
the night came, I went to bed, for I was very tired : I 
must keep myself strong, for something unfriendly 
was on its way and I must be able to meet it ! I 
knew well I should not sleep until I heard the sounds 
of his arrival : those came about one o’clock, and in a 
moment I was dreaming. 


1S6 THE flight of the shadow. 

In my dream I was still awake, and still watching 
for my uncle’s return. I heard the sound of Death’s 
hoofs, not on the stones of the yard, but on the gravel 
before the house, and coming round the house till 
under my window. There he stopped, and I heard my 
uncle call to me to come down : he wanted me. In 
my dream I was a child ; I sprang out of bed, ran 
from the house on my bare feet, jumped into his down- 
stretched arms, and was in a moment seated in front 
of him. Death gave a great plunge, and went off like 
the wind, cleared the gate in a flying stride, and rushed 
up the hill to the heath. The wind was blowing be- 
hind us furiously : I could hear it roaring, but did not 
feel it, for it could not overtake us ; we outstripped 
and kept ahead of it ; if for a moment we slackened 
speed, it fell upon us raging. 

We came at length to the pool near the heart of 
the heath, and I wondered that, at the speed we were 
making, we had been such a time in reaching it. It 
was the dismalest spot, with its crumbling peaty banks, 
and its water brown as tea. Tradition declared it had 
no bottom — went down into nowhere. 

“ Here,” said my uncle, bringing his horse to a 
sudden halt, “ we had a terrible battle once, Death and 
I, with the worm that lives in this hole. You know 
what worm it is, do you not ?” 

I had heard of the worm, and any time I happened, 


A VERY STRANGE THING. 


87 


in galloping about the heath, to find myself near the 
pool, the thought would always come back with a 
fresh shudder — what if the legend were a true one, 
and the worm was down there biding his time ! J>ut 
anything more about the worm I had never heard. 

“ No, uncle,” I answered; “I don’t know what 
worm it is.” 

“ Ah,” he answered, with a sigh, “ if you do not 
take the more care, little one, you will some day 
learn, not what the worm is called, but what it is ! 
The worm that lives there, is the worm that never 
dies.” 

I gave a shriek ; I had never heard of the horrible 
creature before — so it seemed in my dream. To think 
of its being so near us, and never dying, was too ter- 
rible. 

“ Don’t be frightened, little one,” he said, pressing 
me closer to his bosom. “ Death and I killed it. 
Come with me to the other side, and you will see it 
lying there, stiff and stark.” 

“ But, uncle,” I said, “ how can it be dead — how 
can you have killed it, if it never dies?” 

“ Ah, that is the mystery ! ” he returned. “ But 
come and see. It was a terrible fight. I never had 
such a fight — or dear old Death either. But she’s 
dead now ! It was worth living for, to make away 
with such a monster ! ” 


1 88 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


We rode round the pool, cautiously because of the 
crumbling banks, to see the worm lie dead. On and 
on we rode. I began to think we must have ridden 
many times round the hole. 

“ I wonder where it can be, uncle ! ” I said at 
length. 

“ We shall come to it very soon,” he answered. 

“ But,” I said, “ mayn’t we have ridden past it 
without seeing it ?” 

He laughed a loud and terrible laugh. 

“ When once you have seen it, little one,” he re- 
plied, “ you too will laugh at the notion of having rid- 
den past it without seeing it. The worm that never 
dies is hardly a thing to escape notice ! ” 

We rode on and on. All at once my uncle threw 
up his hands, dropping the reins, and with a fearful 
cry covered his face. 

“ It is gone ! I have not killed it ! No, I have 
not ! It is here ! it is here ! ” he cried, pressing his 
hand to his heart. It is here, and it was here all the 
time I thought it dead ! What will become of me ! 
I am lost, lost ! ” 

At the word, old Death gave a scream, and laying 
himself out, flew with all the might of his swift limbs 
to get away from the place. But the wind, which was 
behind us as we came, now stormed in our faces ; 
and presently I saw we should never reach home, for, 


A VERY STRANGE THING. 


89 


with all Death’s fierce endeavor, we moved but an 
inch or two in the minute, and that with a killing 
struggle. 

“Little one,” said my uncle, “if you don’t get 
down we shall all be lost. I feel the worm rising. It 
is your weight that keeps poor Death from making 
any progress.” 

I turned my head, leaning past my uncle, so as to 
see behind him. A long neck, surmounted by a head 
of indescribable horror, was slowly rising straight up 
out of the middle of the pool. It should not catch 
them ! I slid down by my uncle’s leg. The moment 
I touched the ground and let go, away went Death, 
and in an instant was out of sight. I was not afraid. 
My heart was lifted up with the thought that I was 
going to die for my uncle and old Death. The red 
worm was on the bank. It was crawling toward me. 
I went to meet it. It sprang from the ground, threw 
itself upon me, and twisted itself about me. It was 
a human embrace, the embrace of some one unknown 
that loved me. 

I awoke and left the dream. But the dream never 
left me. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 

I rose early, and went to my uncle’s room. He 
was awake, but complained of headache. I took him 
a cup of tea, and at his request left him. 

About noon Martha brought me a letter where I 
sat alone in the drawing-room. I carried it to my 
uncle. He took it with a trembling hand, read it, and 
fell back with his eyes closed. I ran for brandy. 

“ Don’t be frightened, little one,” he called after 
me. “ I don’t want anything.” 

“ Won’t you tell me what is the matter, uncle ? ” 
I said, returning. “Is it necessary I should be kept 
ignorant ? ” 

“ Not at all, my little one.” 

“ Don’t you think, uncle,” I dared to continue, for- 
getting in my love all difference of years, “ that, what- 
ever it be that troubles us, it must be better those who 
love us should know it ? Is there some good in a 
secret after all ? ” 

“ None, my darling,” he answered. “ The thing 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


I 9 I 

that made me talk to you so against secrets when you 
were a child, was, that I had one myself — one that 
was, and is, eating the heart out of me. But that wom- 
an shall not know and you be ignorant ! I will not 
have a secret with her ! — Leave me now, please, little 
one.” 

I rose at once. 

“ May I take the letter with me, uncle ?” I asked. 

He rubbed his forehead with a still trembling hand. 
The trembling of that beloved hand filled me with 
such a divine sense of pity, that for the first time I 
seemed to know God, causing in me that conscious- 
ness ! The whole human mother was roused in me 
for my fincle. I would die, I would kill to save him ! 
The worm was welcome to swallow me ! My very be- 
ing was a well of loving pity, pouring itself out over 
that trembling hand. 

He took up the letter, gave it to me, and turned his 
face away with a groan. I left the room in strange 
exaltation — the exaltation of merest love. 

I went to the study, and there read the hateful 
letter. 

Here it is. Having transcribed it, I shall de- 
stroy it. 

“ Sir, — For one who persists in coming between a 
woman and her son, who will blame the mother if she 


192 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


cast aside forbearance ! I would have spared you 
as hitherto; I will spare you no longer. You little 
thought when you crossed me who I was — the one in 
the world in whose power you lay ! I would perish 
everlastingly rather than permit one of my blood to 
marry one of yours. My words are strong ; you are 
welcome to call them unladylike ; but you shall not 
doubt what I mean. You know perfectly that, if I de- 
nounce you as a murderer, I can prove what I say ; 
and as to my silence for so many years, I am able 
thoroughly to account for it. I shall give you no 
further warning. You know where my son is: if he is 
not in my house within two days, I shall have you 
arrested. I have made up my mind. • 

“Lucretia Cairnedge. 

“ Rising-Manor, July 15, 18 — .” 

“ Whoever be the father, she’s the mother of lies ! ' 

I exclaimed. — “ My uncle — the best and gentlest of 
men, a murderer ! ” 

I laughed aloud in my indignation and wrath. 

But, though the woman was a liar, she must have 
something to say with a show of truth ! How else 
would she dare intimidation with such a man ? How 
else could her threat have so wrought upon my uncle ? 
What did she know, or imagine she knew ? What could 
be the something on which she founded her lie ? — 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


193 


That my uncle was going to tell me, nor did I dread 
hearing his story. No revelation would lower him 
in my eyes ! Of that I was confident. But I little 
thought how long it would be before it came, or what 
a terrible tale it would prove. 

I ran down the stair with the vile paper in my 
hand. 

“ The wicked woman ! ” I cried. “ If she be John’s 
mother, I don’t care : she’s a devil and a liar ! ” 

“Hush, hush, little one!” said my uncle, with a 
smile in which the sadness seemed to intensify the 
sweetness ; “ you do not know anything against her ! 
You do not know she is a liar ! ” 

“ There are things, uncle, one knows without know- 
ing ! ” 

“ What if I said she told no lie ? ” 

“ I should say she was a liar although she told 
no lie. My uncle is not what she threatens to say 
he is ! ” 

“But men have repented, and grown so different 
you would not know them : how can you tell it has 
not been so with me ? I may have been a bad man 
once, and grown better ! ” 

“ I know you are trying to prepare me for what 
you think will be a shock, uncle!” I answered; “but 
I want no preparing. Out with your worst ! I defy 
you ! ” 


17 


194 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


Ah me, confident ! But I had not to repent of my 
confidence ! 

My uncle gave a great sigh. He looked as if there 
was nothing for him now but to tell all. Evidently he 
shrank from the task. 

He put his hand over his eyes, and said slowly : 

“ You belong to a world, little one, of which you 
know next to nothing. More than Satan have fallen 
as lightning from heaven ! ” 

He lay silent so long that I was constrained to 
speak again. 

“Well, uncle dear,” I said, “are you not going to 
tell me?” 

“ I can not,” he answered. 

There was absolute silence for, I should think, 
about twenty minutes. I could not and would not 
urge him to speak. What right had I to rouse a kill- 
ing effort! He was not bound to tell me anything! 
But I mourned the impossibility of doing my best for 
him, poor as that best might be. 

“ Do not think, my darling,” he said at last, and 
laid his hand on my head as I knelt beside him, “ that 
I have the least difficulty in trusting you ; it is only 
in telling you. I would trust you with my eternal 
soul. You can see well enough there is something ter- 
rible to tell for would I not otherwise laugh to scorn 
the threat of that bad woman ? No one on the earth 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


195 


has so little right to say what she knows of me. Yet 
I do share a secret with her which feels as if it would 
burst my heart. I wish it would. That would open 
the one way out of all my trouble. Believe me, little 
one, if any ever needed God, I need him. I need the 
pardon that goes hand in hand with righteous judg-> 
ment, the pardon of him who alone can make lawful 
excuse.” 

“ May God be your judge, uncle, and neither man 
nor woman ! ” 

“ I do not think you would altogether condemn me, 
little one, much as I loathe myself — terribly as I de- 
serve condemnation.” 

“Condemn you, uncle! I want to know all, just to 
show you that nothing can make the least difference. 
If you were as bad as that bad woman says, you 
should find there was one of your own blood who 
knew what love meant. But I know you are good, 
uncle, whatever you may have done.” 

“ Little one, you comfort me,” sighed my uncle. 
“ I can not tell you this thing, for when I had told it, 
I should want to kill myself more than ever. But 
neither can I bear that you should not know it. I 
will not have a secret with that woman. I have always 
intended to tell you everything. I have the whole 
fearful story set down for your eyes — and those of 
any you may. wish to see it: I can not speak the 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


I96 

words into your ears. The paper I will give you 
now ; but you will not open it until I give you leave.” 

“ Certainly not, uncle.” 

“ If I should die before you have read it, I permit 
and desire you to read it. I know your loyalty so 
well, that I believe you would not look at it even after 
my death, if I had not given you permission. There 
are those who treat the dead as if they had no more 
rights of any kind. ‘ Get away to Hades,’ they say ; 

‘ you are nothing now.’ But you will not behave so 
to your uncle, little one ! When the time comes for 
you to read my story, remember that I now , in prepa- 
ration for the knowledge that will give you, ask you to 
pardon me then for all the pain it will cause you and 
your husband — John being that husband. I have 
tried to do my best for you, Orbie: how much better 
I might have done had I had a clear conscience, God 
only knows. It may be that I was the tenderer uncle 
that I could not be a better one.” 

He hid his face in his hands and burst into a 
tempest of weeping. 

It was terrible to see the man to whom I had all 
my life looked with a reverence that prepared me for 
knowing the great Father, weeping like a bitterly re- 
pentant and self-abhorrent child. It seemed sacrilege 
to be present. I felt as if my eyes, only for seeing 
him thus, deserved the ravens to pick them out. 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


I 9 7 


I could not contain myself. I rose and threw my 
arms about him, got close to him as a child to her 
mother, and, as soon as the passion of my love would 
let me, sobbed out : 

“ Uncle ! darling uncle ! I love you more than 
ever ! I did not know before that I could love so 
much ! I could kill that woman with my own hands ! 
I wish I had killed her when I pulled her down that 
day ! It is right to kill poisonous creatures : she is 
worse than any snake ! ” 

He smiled a sad little smile, and shook his head. 
Then first I seemed to understand a little. A dull 
flash went through me. 

I stood up, drew back, and gazed at him. My 
eyes fixed themselves on his. I stared into them. 
He had ceased to weep, and lay regarding me with 
calm response. 

“You don’t mean, uncle, — ” 

“Yes, little one, I do. That woman was the cause 
of the action for which she threatens to denounce me 
as a murderer. I do not say she intended to bring it 
about ; but none the less was she the consciously 
wicked and willful cause of it. — And you will marry 
her son, and be her daughter ! ” he added, with a 
groan as of one in unutterable despair. 

I sprang back from him. My very proximity was 
a pollution to him while he believed such a thing of me ! 


198 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“Never, uncle, never!” I cried. “How can you 
think so ill of one who loves you as I do ! I will de- 
nounce her ! She will be hanged, and we shall be at 
peace ! ” 

“And John?” said my uncle. 

“John must look after himself!” I answered, 
fiercely. “ Because he chooses to have such a mother, 
am I to bring her a hair’s-breadth nearer to my uncle ! 
Not for any man that ever was born ! John must 
discard his mother, or he and I are as we were ! A 
mother! she is a hyena, a shark, a monster! Uncle, 
she is a devil! — I don’t care! It is true; and what is 
true is the right thing to say. I will go to her, and 
tell her to her face what she is ! ” 

I turned and made for the door. My heart felt as 
big as the biggest man’s. 

“ If she kill you, little one,” said my uncle, quietly, 
“ I shall be left with nobody to take care of me ! ” 

I burst into fresh tears. I saw that I was a fool, 
and could do nothing. 

“ Poor John ! — To have such a mother ! ” I sobbed. 
Then in a rage of rebellion I cried, “ I don’t believe 
she is his mother ! Is it possible now, uncle — does it 
stand to reason, that such a pestilence of a woman 
should ever have borne such a child as my John? I 
don’t, I can’t, I won’t believe it ! ” 

“ I am afraid there are mysteries in the world quite 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


I99 

as hard to explain ! ” replied my uncle. “ I confess, if 
I had known who was his mother, I should have been 
far from ready to yield my consent to your engage- 
ment.” 

“ What does it matter ? ” I said. “ Of course I 
shall not marry him ! ” 

“Not marry him, child!” returned my uncle. 
“What are you thinking of? Is the poor fel- 
low to suffer for, as well as by, the sins of his 
mother ? ” 

“ If you think, uncle, that I will bring you into any 
kind of relation with that horrible woman, if the worst 
of it were only that you would have to see her once 
because she was my husband’s mother, you are mis- 
taken. She to threaten you if you did not send back 
her son, as if John were a horse you had stolen ! You 
have been the angel of God about me all the days of 
my life, but even to please you, I can not consent to 
despise myself. Besides, you know what she threat- 
ens!” 

“ She shall not hurt me. I will take care of myself 
for your sakes. Your life shall not be clouded by 
scandal about your uncle.” 

“How are you to prevent it, uncle dear? Fulfill 
'her threat or not, she would be sure to talk ! ” 

“When she sees it can serve no purpose, she will 
hardly risk reprisals.” 


200 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ She will certainly not risk them when she finds we 
have said good-by. ” 

“ But how would that serve me, little one ? What ! 
would you heap on your uncle’s conscience, already 
overburdened, the misery of keeping two lovely lovers 
apart ? I will tell you what I have resolved upon. I 
will have no more secrets from you, Orba. Oh, how I 
thank you, dearest, for not casting me off ! ” 

Again I threw myself on my knees by his bed. 
“Uncle,” I cried, my heart ready to break with the 
effort to show itself, “ if I did not now love you more 
than ever, I should deserve to be cast out, and trodden 
under foot ! — What do you think of doing ? ” 

“ I shall leave the country, not to return while the 
woman lives.” 

“ I’m ready, uncle,” I said, springing to my feet ; 
“ — at least I shall be in a few minutes ! ” 

“But hear me out, little one,” he rejoined, with a 
smile of genuine pleasure ; “ you don’t know half my 
plan yet. How am I to live abroad, if my property 
go to rack and ruin ? Listen, and don’t say anything 
till I have done; I have no time to lose; I must get 
up at once. — As soon as I am on board at Dover for 
Paris, you and John must get yourselves married the 
first possible moment, and settle down here — to make 
the best of the farm you can, and send me what 
you can spare. I shall not want much, and John will 


THE EVIL DRAWS NIGHER. 


201 


have his own soon. I know you will be good to 
Martha ! ” 

“ John may take the farm if he will. It would be 
immeasurably better than living with his mother. For 
me, I am going with my uncle. Why, uncle, I should 
be miserable in John’s very arms and you out of the 
country for our sakes ! Is there to be nobody in the 
world but husbands, forsooth ! I should love John 
ever so much more away with you and my duty, than 
if I had him with me, and you a wanderer. How 
happy I shall be, thinking of John, and taking care of 
you ! ” 

He let me run on. When I stopped at length — 

“ In any case,” he said with a smile, “ we can not 
do much till I am dressed ! ” 


CHAPTER XXVII. 


AN ENCOUNTER. 

I left my uncle’s room, and went to my own, to 
make what preparation I could for going abroad with 
him. I got out my biggest box, and put in all my 
best things, and all the trifles I thought I could not do 
without. Then, as there was room, I put in things I 
could do without, which yet wpuld be useful. Still 
there was room ; the contents would shake about in 
the continent ! So I began to put in things I should 
like to have, but which were neither necessary nor 
useful. Before I had got these in, the box was more 
than full, and some of them had to be taken out 
again. In choosing which were to go and which to 
be left, I lost time ; but I did not know anything 
about the trains, and expected to be ready before my 
uncle, who would call me when he thought fit. 

My thoughts also hindered my hands. Very likely 
I should never marry John; I would not heed that; 
he would be mine all the same ! but to promise that 
I would not marry him, because it suited such a 


AN ENCOUNTER. 


203 


mother’s plans to marry him to some one else — that I 
would not do to save my life! I would have done it 
to save my uncle’s, but our exile would render it un- 
necessary ! 

At last I was ready, and went to find my uncle, re- 
proaching myself that I had been so long away from 
him. Besides, I ought to have been helping him to 
pack, for neither he nor his arm was quite strong yet. 
With a heartful of apology, I sought his room. He 
was not there. Neither was he in the study. I went 
all over the house, and then to the stable ; but he was 
nowhere, neither had any one seen him. And Death 
was gone too ! 

The truth burst upon me : I was to see him no 
more while that terrible woman lived ! No one was to 
know whither he had gone! He ‘had given himself for 
my happiness ! Vain intention ! I should never be 
happy ! To be in Paradise without him, would not be 
to be in heaven ! 

John was in London ; I could do nothing ! I threw 
myself on my uncle’s bed, and lay lost in despair ! 
Even if John were with me, and we found him, what 
could we do ? I knew it now as impossible for him 
to separate us that he might be unmolested, as it was 
for us to accept the sacrifice of his life that we might 
be happy. I knew that John’s way would be to leave 
everything and go with me and my uncle, only we 


204 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


could not live upon nothing — least of all in a strange 
land ! Martha, to be sure, could manage well enough 
with the bailiff, but John could not burden my uncle, 
and could not lay his hands on his own ! In the mean 
time my uncle was gone we knew not whither ! I was 
like one lost on the dark mountains. — If only John 
would come to take part in my despair ! 

With a sudden agony, I reproached myself that I 
had made no attempt to overtake my uncle. It was 
true I did not know, for nobody could tell me, in what 
direction he had gone ; but Zoe’s instinct might have 
sufficed where mine was useless ! Zoe might have 
followed and found Thanatos! It was hopeless 
now ! 

But I could no longer be still. I got Zoe, and fled 
to the moor. All the* rest of the day I rode hither and 
thither, nor saw a single soul on its wide expanse. 
The very life seemed to have gone out of it. When 
most we take comfort in loneliness, it is because there 
is some one behind it. 

The sun was set and the twilight deepening toward 
night when I turned to ride home. I had eaten noth- 
ing since breakfast, and though not hungry, was thor- 
oughly tired. Through the great dark hush, where was 
no sound of water, though here and there, like lurking 
live thing, it lay about me, I rode slowly back. My 
fasting and the dusk made everything in turn take a 


AN ENCOUNTER. 


205 


shape that was not its own. I seemed to be haunted 
by things unknown. I have sometimes thought wheth- 
er the spirits that love solitary places may not delight 
in appropriating, for embodiment momentary and par- 
tial, such a present shape as may happen to fit one of 
their passing moods; whether it is always the mere 
gnarled, crone-like hawthorn, or misshapen rock, that, 
between the wanderer and the pale sky, suddenly ap- 
pals him with the sense of another. The hawthorn, 
the rock, the dead pine, is indeed there, but is it alone 
there ? 

Some such thought was, I remember, in my mind, 
when, about half-way from home, I grew aware of 
something a little way in front that rose between me 
and a dark part of the sky. It seemed a figure on a 
huge horse. My first thought, very natvrally, was of 
my uncle ; the next, of the great gray horse and his 
rider that John and I had both seen on the moor. I 
confess to a little awe at the thought of the latter; 
but I am somehow made so as to be capable of awe 
without terror, and of the latter I felt nothing. The 
composite figure drew nearer : it was a woman on 
horseback. Immediately I recalled the adventure of 
my childhood; and then remembered that John had 
said his mother always rode the biggest horse she 
could find : could that shape, towering in the half- 
dark before me, be indeed my deadly enemy — she 


20 6 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


who, my uncle had warned me, would kill me if she 
had the chance ? A fear far other than ghostly in- 
vaded me, and for a moment I hesitated whether to 
ride on, or turn and make for some covert, until she 
should have passed from between me and my home. 
I hope it was something better than pride that made 
me hold on my way. If the wicked, I thought, flee 
when no man pursueth, it ill becomes the righteous to 
flee before the wicked. By this time it was all but 
dark night, and I had a vague hope of passing un- 
questioned : there had been a good deal of rain, and 
we were in a very marshy part of the heath, so that I 
did not care to leave the track. But, just ere we met, 
the lady turned her great animal right across the way, 
and there made him- stand. 

“ Ah,” thought I, “ what could Zoe do in a race 
with that terrible horse ! ” 

He seemed made of the darkness, and rose like the 
figure-head of a frigate above a yacht. 

w Show me the way to Rising,” said his rider. 

The hard bell voice was unmistakable. 

“When you come where the track forks,” I began. 

She interrupted me. 

“ How can I distinguish in the dark ? ” she re- 
turned angrily. “Go on before, and show me the 
way.” 

Now I had good reason for thinking she knew the 


AN ENCOUNTER. 


20 7 

way perfectly well ; and still better reason for declin- 
ing to go on in front of her. 

“ You must excuse me,” I said, “for it is time I 
were at home ; but if you will turn and ride on in 
front of me, I will show you a better, though rather 
longer way to Rising.” 

“ Go on, or I will ride you down,” she cried, turn- 
ing her horse’s head toward me, and making her whip 
hiss through the air. 

The sound of it so startled Zoe, that she sprang 
aside, and was off the road a few yards before I 
could pull her up. Then I saw the woman urging her 
horse to follow. I knew the danger she was in, and, 
though tempted to be silent, called to her with a loud 
warning. 

“ Mind what you are doing, Lady Cairnedge ! ” I 
cried. “ The ground here will not carry the weight of 
a horse like yours.” 

But as I spoke he gave in, and sprang across the 
ditch at the wayside. There, however, he stood. 

“ You think to escape me,” she answered, in a low, 
yet clear voice, with a cat-like growl in it. “You 
make a mistake 1 ” 

“ Your ladyship will make a worse mistake if you 
follow me here,” I replied. 

Her only rejoinder was a cut with her whip to her 
horse, which had stood motionless since taking his 


208 the flight of the shadow. 

unwilling jump. I spoke to Zoe ; she bounded off like 
a fawn. I pulled her up, and looked back. 

Lady Cairnedge continued urging her horse. I 
heard and saw her whipping him furiously. She had 
lost her temper. 

I warned her once more, but she persisted. 

“ Then you must take the consequences ! ” I said ; 
and Zoe and I made for the road, but at a point nearer 
home. 

Had she not been in a passion, she would have, 
seen that her better way was to return to the road, 
and intercept us; but her anger blinded her both 
to that and to the danger of the spot she was in. 

We had not gone far when we heard behind us the 
soft plunging and sucking of the big hoofs through 
the boggy ground. I looked over my shoulder. There 
was the huge bulk, like Wordsworth’s Peak, towering 
between us and the stars ! 

“ Go, Zoe ! ” I shrieked. 

She bounded away. The next moment, a cry came 
from the horse behind us, and I heard the woman say 
“ Good God ! ” I stopped, and peered through the 
dark. I saw something, but it was no higher above 
the ground than myself. Terror seized me. I turned 
and rode back. 

“ My stupid animal has bogged himself ! ,r said 
Lady Cairnedge quietly. 


AN ENCOUNTER. 


209 


Deep in the dark watery peat, as thick as porridge, 
her horse gave a fruitless plunge or two and sank 
lower. 

“ For God’s sake,” I cried, “ get off ! your weight 
is sinking the poor animal ! You will smother him ! ” 

“ It will serve him right,” she said venomously, 
and gave the helpless creature a cut across the 
ears. 

“ You will go down with him, if you do not make 
haste,” I insisted. 

Another moment and she stood erect on the ’back 
of the slowly sinking horse. 

“ Come and give me your hand,” she cried. 

“You want to smother me with him! I think I 
will not,” I answered. “You can get on the solid 
well enough. I will ride home and bring help for 
your horse, poor fellow ! Stay by him, talk to him, 
and keep him as quiet as you can. If he go on strug- 
gling, nothing will save him.” 

She replied with a contemptuous laugh. 

I got to the road as quickly as possible, and gal- 
loped home as fast as Zoe could touch and lift. 
Ere I reached the stable-yard, I shouted so as to bring 
out all the men. When I told them a lady had her 
horse fast in the bog, they bustled and coiled ropes, 
put collars and chains on four draught horses, lighted 
several lanterns, and set out with me. I knew the 


210 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


spot perfectly. No moment was lost either in getting 
ready, or in reaching the place. 

Neither the lady nor her horse was to be 
seen. 

A great horror wrapped me round. I felt a mur- 
deress. She might have failed to spring to the bank 
of the hole for lack of the hand she had asked me to 
reach out ! Or her habit might have been entangled, 
so that she fell short, and went to the bottom — to be 
found, one day, hardly changed, by the side of her 
peat-embalmed stead ! — no ill-fitting fate for her, but 
a ghastly thing to have a hand in ! 

She might, however, be on her way to Rising on 
foot ! I told two of the men to mount a pair of 
the horses, and go with me on the chance of rendering 
her assistance. 

We took the way to Rising, and had gone about 
two miles when we saw her, through the starlight, 
walking steadily along the track. I rode up to her, 
and offered her one of the cart-horses : I would not 
have trusted my Zoe with her any more than with an 
American lion that lives upon horses. She declined 
the proffer with quiet scorn. I offered her one or 
both men to see her home, but the way in which she 
refused their service made them glad they had not to 
go with her. We had no choice, therefore turned and 
left her to get home as she might. 


AN ENCOUNTER. 


21 I 


Not until we were on the way back did it occur to 
me that I had not asked Martha whether she knew 
anything about my uncle’s departure. She was never 
one to volunteer news, and, besides, would naturally 
think me in his confidence ! 

I found she knew nothing of our expedition, as no 
one had gone into the house — had only heard the 
horses and voices, and wondered. I was able to tell 
her what had happened ; but the moment I began to 
question her as to any knowledge of my uncle’s in- 
tentions, my strength gave way, and I burst into 
tears. 

“ Don’t be silly, Belorba ! ” cried Martha, almost 
severely. “ You an engaged young lady, and tied so 
to your uncle’s apron-strings that you cry the min- 
ute he’s out of your sight! You didn’t cry when Mr. 
Day left you ! ” 

“ No,” I answered ; “ he was going only for a day 
or two ! ” 

“ And for how many is your uncle gone ? ” 

“ That is what I want to know. He means to be 
away a long time, I fear.” 

“ Then it’s nothing but your fancy sets you cry- 
ing ! — But I’ll just see ! ” she returned. “ I shall know 
by the money he left for the housekeeping! Only I 
won’t budge till I see you eat.” 

Faint for want of food, I had no appetite. But I 


212 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


began at once to eat, and she left me to fetch the 
money he had given her as he went. 

She came back with a pocket-book, opened it, and 
looked into it. Then she looked at me. Her expres- 
sion was of unmistakable dismay. I took the pocket- 
book from her hand : it was full of notes ! 

I learned afterward, that it was his habit to have 
money in the house, in readiness for some possible 
sudden need of it. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 


ANOTHER VISION. 

That same night, within an hour, to my unspeak- 
able relief, John came home — at least he came to me, 
who he always said was his home. It was rather late, 
but we went out to the wilderness, where I had a 
good cry on his shoulder; after which I felt better, 
and hope began to show signs of life in me. I never 
asked him how he had got on in London, but told him 
all that had happened since he went. It was worse 
than painful to tell him about his mother’s letter, and 
what my uncle told me in consequence of it, also my 
personal adventure with her so lately ; but I felt I 
must hide nothing. If a man’s mother is a devil, it is 
well he should know it. 

He sat like a sleeping hurricane while I spoke, 
saying never a word. When I had ended — 

“ Is that all ? ” he asked. 

“ It is all, John: is it not enough?” I an- 
swered. 

“ It is enough,” he cried, with an oath that fright- 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


214 

ened me, and started to his feet. The hurricane was 
awake.' 

I threw my arms round him. 

“ Where are you going ? ” I said. 

“ To her” he answered. 

“ What for ? ” 

“To kill her,” he said — then threw himself on the 
ground, and lay motionless at my feet. 

I kept silence. I thought with myself he was 
fighting the nature his mother had given him. 

He lay still for about two minutes, then quietly 
rose. 

“Good-night, dearest!” he said; “ — no; good- 
by ! It is not fit the son of such a mother should 
marry any honest woman.” 

“I beg your pardon, John! ” I returned; “I hope 
/ may have a word in the matter ! If I choose to 
marry you, what right have you to draw back ? Let 
us leave alone the thing that has to be, and remember 
that my uncle must not be denounced as a murderer ! 
Something must be done. That he is beyond personal 
danger for the present is something ; but is he to be 
the talk of the country ? ” 

“No harm shall come to him,” said John. “If I 
don’t throttle the tigress, I’ll muzzle her. I know 
how to deal with her. She has learned at least, that 
what her stupid son says, he does ! I shall make her 


ANOTHER VISION. 


215 


understand that, on her slightest movement to dis- 
grace your uncle, I will marry you right off, come 
what may ; and if she goes on, I shall get myself sum- 
moned for the defense, that, if I can say nothing for 
him , I may say something against her. Besides, I will 
tell her that, when my time comes, if I find anything 
amiss with her accounts, I will give her no quarter. — 
But, Orbie,” he continued, “as I will not threaten 
what I may not be able to perform, you must promise 
not to prevent me from carrying it out.” 

“I promise,” I said, “that, if it be necessary for 
your truth, I will marry you at once. I only hope she 
may not already have taken steps ! ” 

“ Her two days are not yet expired. I shall pre- 
sent myself in good time. — But I wonder you are not 
afraid to trust yourself alone with the son of such a 
mother ! ” 

“To be what I know you, John,” I answered, “and 
the son of that woman, shows a good angel was not 
far off at your birth. But why talk of angels ? Who- 
ever was your mother, God is your father ! ” 

He made no reply beyond a loving pressure of my 
hand. Then he asked me whether 1 could lend him 
something to ride home upon. I told him there was 
an old horse the bailiff rode sometimes; I was very 
sorry he could not have Zoe: she had been out all 
day and was too tired ! He said Zoe was much too 


21 6 THE flight of the shadow. 

precious for a hulking fellow like him to ride, but he 
would be glad of the old horse. 

I went to the stable with him, and saw him mount. 
What a determined look there was on his face ! He 
seemed quite a middle-aged man. 

I have now to tell how he fared on the moor as he 
rode. 

It had turned gusty and rather cold, and was still 
a dark night. The moon would be up by and by, how- 
ever, and giving light enough, he thought, before he 
came to the spot where his way parted company with 
that to Dumbleton. The moon, however, did not see 
fit to rise so soon as John expected her : he was not at 
that time quite up in moons, any more than in the 
paths across that moor. 

Now as he had not an idea where his rider wanted 
to be carried, and as John did for a while — he con- 
fessed it — fall into a reverie or something worse, old 
Sturdy had to choose for himself where to go, and 
took a path he had often had to take some years be- 
fore; nor did John discover that he was out of the 
way, until he felt him going steep down, and thought 
of Sleipner bearing Hermod to the realm of Hela. 
But he let him keep on, wishing to know, as he said, 
what the old fellow was up to. Presently, he came to 
a dead halt. 

John had not the least notion where they were, but 


ANOTHER VISION. 


217 


I knew the spot the moment he began to describe it. 
By the removal of the peat on the side of a slope, the 
skeleton of the hill had been a little exposed, and had 
for a good many years been blasted for building- 
stones. Nothing was going on in the quarry at pres- 
ent. Above, it was rather a dangerous place; there 
was a legend of man and horse having fallen into it, 
and both being killed. John had never seen or heard 
of it. 

When his horse stopped, he became aware of an 
indefinite sensation which inclined him to await the 
expected moon before attempting either to advance or 
return. He thought afterward it might have been 
some feeling of the stone about him, but at the time 
he took the place for an abrupt natural dip of the sur- 
face of the moor, in the bottom of which might be a 
pool. Sturdy stood as still as if he had been part of 
the quarry, stood as if never of himself would he move 
again. 

The light slowly grew, or rather, the darkness 
slowly thinned. All at once John became aware that, 
some yards away from him, there was something 
whitish. A moment, and it began to move like a 
flitting mist through the darkness. The same instant 
Sturdy began to pull his feet from the ground, and 
move after the mist, which rose and rose until it came 
for a second or two between John and the sky : it was 


2 1 8 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


a big white horse, with my uncle on his back : Death 
and he, John concluded, were out on one of their dark 
wanderings ! His impulse, of course, was to follow 
them. But, as they went up the steep way, Sturdy 
came down on his old knees, and John got off his back 
to let him recover himself the easier. * When they 
reached the level, where the moon, showing a blunt 
horn above the horizon, made it possible to see a little, 
the white horse and his rider had disappeared — in 
some shadow, or behind some knoll, I fancy ; and 
John, having not the least notion in what part of the 
moor he was, or in which direction he ought to go, 
threw the reins on the horse’s neck. Sturdy brought 
him back almost to his stable, before he knew where 
he was. Then he turned into the road, for he had had 
enough of the moor, and took the long way home. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 


MOTHER AND SON. 

In the morning he breakfasted alone. A son 
with a different sort of mother, might then have 
sought her in her bed-room; but John had never 
within his memory seen his mother in her bed-room, 
and, after what he had heard the night before, 
could hardly be inclined to go there to her now. 
Within half an hour however, a message was brought 
him, requesting his presence in her ladyship’s dressing- 
room. 

He went with his teeth set. 

“Whose horse is that in the stable, John?” she 
said, the moment their eyes met. 

“ Mr. Whichcote’s, madam,” answered John : 
mother he could not say. 

“You intend to keep up your late relations with 
those persons ? ” 

“ I do.” 

“ You mean to marry the hussy ? ” 

“ I mean to marry the lady to whom you give that 


220 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


epithet. There are those who think it not quite safe 
for you to call other people names ! ” 

She rose and came at him as if she would strike 
him. John stood motionless. Except a woman had a 
knife in her hand, he said, he would not even avoid a 
blow from her. “ A woman can’t hurt you much ; she 
can only break your heart ! ” he said. “ My mother 
would not know a heart when she had broken it ! ” he 
added. 

He stood and looked at her. 

She turned away, and sat down again. I think she 
felt the term of her power at hand. 

“ The man told you, then, that if you did not re- 
turn immediately, I would get him into trouble ? ” 

“ He has told me nothing. I have not seen him 
for some days. I have been to London.” 

“ You should have contrived your story better : 
you contradict yourself.” 

“ I am not aware that I do.” 

“You have the man’s horse! ” 

“ His horse is in my stable ; he is not himself at 
home.” 

“ Fled from justice ! It shall not avail him ! ” 

“It may avail you though, madam ! It is some- 
times prudent to let well alone. May I not suggest 
that a hostile attempt on your part, might lead to 
awkward revelations?” 


MOTHER AND SON. 


221 


“ Ah, where could the seed of slander find fitter soil 
than the heart of a son with whom the prayer of his 
mother is powerless ! ” 

To all appearance she had thoroughly regained 
her composure, and looked at him with a quite artistic 
reproach. 

“ The prayer of a mother that never prayed in her 
life ! " returned John ; “ — of a woman that never had 
an anxiety but for herself! — I don’t believe you are 
my mother. If I was born of you, there must have 
been some juggling with my soul in antenatal regions ! 
I disown you ! ” cried John with indignation that grew 
as he gave it issue.. 

Her face turned ashy white ; but whether it was 
from conscience or fear, or only with rage, who could 
tell! 

She was silent for a moment. Then again recover- 
ing herself — 

“ And what, pray, would you make of me ? ” she 
said coolly. “ Your slave ? ” 

“ I would have you an honest woman ! I would die 
for that ! — Oh, mother ! mother ! ” he cried bitterly. 

“ That being apparently impossible, what else does 
my dutiful son demand of his mother ? ” 

“That she should leave me unmolested in my 
choice of a wife. It does not seem to me an unrea- 
sonable demand!” 


222 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Nor does it seem to me an unreasonable reply, 
that any mother would object to her son’s marrying a 
girl whose father she could throw into a felon’s prison 
with a word ! ” 

“ That the girl does not happen to be the daughter 
of the gentleman you mean, signifies nothing : I am 
very willing she should pass for such. But take care. 
He is ready to meet whatever you have to say. He 
is not gone for his own sake, but to be out of the way 
of our happiness — to prevent you from blasting us 
with a public scandal. If you proceed in your pur- 
pose, we shall marry at once, and make your scheme 
futile.” 

“ How are you to live, pray ?” 

“ Madam, that is my business,” answered John. 

“ Are you aware of the penalty on your marrying 
without my consent ? ” pursued his mother. 

“ I am not. I do not believe there is any such 
penalty.” 

“ You dare me ? ” 

“ I do.” 

“ Marry, then, and take the consequences.” 

“ If there were any, you would not thus warn me 
of them.” 

“ John Day, you are no gentleman ! ’ 

“ I shall not ask your definition of a gentleman, 
madam.” 


MOTHER AND SON. 


223 


“ Your father was a clown ! ” 

“ If my father were present, he would show himself 
a gentleman by making you no answer. If you say a 
word more against him, I will leave the room.” 

“ I tell you your father was a clown and a fool — 
like yourself ! ” 

John turned and went to the stable, had old Sturdy 
saddled, and came to me. 

On his way over the heath, he spent an hour trying 
to find the place where he had been the night before, 
but without success. I presume that Sturdy, with his 
nose in that direction, preferred his stall, and did not 
choose to find the quarry. As often as John left him 
to himself, he went homeward. When John turned his 
head in another direction, he would set out in that 
direction, but gradually work round for the farm. 

John told me all I have just set down, and then 
we talked. 

“ I have already begun to learn farming,” I 
said. 

“ You are the right sort, Orbie ! ” returned John. 
“ I shall be glad to teach you anything I know.” 

“ If you will show me how a farmer keeps his 
books,” I answered, “ that I may understand the bail- 
iff’s, I shall be greatly obliged to you. As to the 
dairy, and poultry-yard, and that kind of thing, Mar- 
tha can teach me as well as any.” 


224 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ I’ll do my best,” said John. 

“ Come along then, and have a talk with Simmons ! 
I feel as if I could bear anything after what you saw 
last night. My uncle is not far off ! He is somewhere 
about with the rest of the angels ! ” 


CHAPTER XXX. 


ONCE MORE, AND YET AGAIN. 

From that hour I set myself to look after my un- 
cle’s affairs. It was the only way to endure his ab- 
sence. Working for him, thinking what he would 
like, trying to carry it out, referring every perplexity 
to him and imagining his answer, he grew so much 
dearer to me, that his absence was filled with hope. 
My heart being in it, I had soon learned enough of 
the management to perceive where, in more than one 
quarter improvement, generally in the way of saving, 
was possible : I do not mean by any lowering of 
wages; my uncle would have conned me small thanks 
for such improvement as that ! Neither was it long 
before I began to delight in the feeling that I was in 
partnership with the powers of life ; that I had to do 
with the operation and government and preservation 
of things created ; that I was doing a work to which 
I was set by the Highest ; that I was at least a floor- 
sweeper in the house of God, a servant for the good 
of his world. Existence had grown fuller and richer; 
x8 


226 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


I had come like a toad out of a rock, into a larger, 
therefore truer universe, in which I had work to do 
that was wanted. Had I not been thus expanded and 
strengthened, how should I have patiently waited 
while hearing nothing of my uncle ! 

It was not many days before John began to press 
me to let my uncle have his way : where was the good 
any longer, he said, in our not being married ? But I 
could not endure the thought of being married with- 
out my uncle : it would not seem real marriage with- 
out his giving me to my husband. And when John 
was convinced that I could not be prevailed upon, I 
found him think the more of me because of my re- 
solve, and my persistency in it. For John was always 
reasonable, and that is more than can be said of most 
men. Some, indeed, who are reasonable enough with 
men, are often unreasonable with women. If in 
course of time the management of affairs be taken 
from men and given to women — which may God for 
our sakes forbid — it will be because men have made 
it necessary by their arrogance. But when they have 
been kept down long enough to learn that they are 
not the lords of creation one bit more than the weak- 
est woman, I hope they will be allowed to take the 
lead again, lest women should become what men were, 
and go strutting in their importance. Only the true 
man knows the true woman ; only the true woman 


ONCE MORE, AND YET AGAIN. 


227 


knows the true man : the difficulty between men and 
women comes all from the prevailing selfishness, that 
is, untruth, of both. Who, while such is their char- 
acter, would be judge or divider between them, save 
one of their own kind ? When such ceases to be their 
character, they will call for no umpire. 

John lived in his own house with his mother, but 
they did not meet. His mother managed his affairs, 
to whose advantage I need hardly say; and John 
helped me to manage my uncle’s, to the advantage of 
all concerned. Every morning he came to see me, and 
every night rode back to his worse than dreary home. 
At my earnest request, he had a strong bolt put on his 
bed-room door, the use of which he promised me never 
to neglect. At my suggestion too, he let it be known 
that he had always a brace of loaded pistols within 
his reach, and showed himself well practiced in Shoot- 
ing with them. I feared much for John. 

After I no longer only believed, but knew the 
bailiff trustworthy, and had got some few points in 
his management bettered, I ceased giving so much 
attention to details, and allowed myself more time to 
read and walk and ride with John. I laid myself out 
to make up to him, as much as ever I could, for the 
miserable lack of any home-life. At Rising he had 
not the least sense of comfort or even security. He 
could never tell what his mother might not be plotting 


228 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


against him. He had a very strong close box made 
for Leander, and always locked him up in it at night, 
never allowing one of the men there to touch him. 
The horse had all the attention any master could 
desire, when, having locked his box behind him, he 
brought him over to us in the morning. 

One lovely, cold day, in the month of March, with 
ice on some of the pools, and the wind blowing from 
the north, I mounted Zoe to meet John midway on the 
moor, and had gone about two thirds of the distance, 
when I saw him, as I thought, a long way to my right, 
and concluded he had not expected me so soon, and 
had gone exploring. I turned aside, therefore, to join 
him ; but had gone only a few yards when from some 
shift in the shadow, or some change in his position 
with regard to the light, I saw that the horse was not 
John’s; it was a gray, or rather, a white horse. Could 
the rider be my uncle ? Even at that distance I almost 
thought I recognized him. It must indeed have been 
he John saw at the quarry ! He was not gone abroad ! 
He had been all this long time lingering about the 
place, lest ill should befall us ! “ Just like him ! ” said 

my heart, as I gave Zoe the rein, and she sprang off 
at her best speed. But after riding some distance, I 
lost sight of the horseman, whoever he was, and then 
saw that, if I did not turn at once, I should not keep 
my appointment with John. Of course had I believed 


ONCE MORE, AND YET AGAIN. 


229 


it was my uncle, I should have followed and followed ; 
and the incident would not have been worth mention- 
ing, for gray horses are not so uncommon that there 
might not be one upon the heath at any moment, but 
for something more I saw the same night. 

It was bright moonlight. I had taken down a 
curtain of my window to mend, and the moon shone 
in so that I could not sleep. My thoughts were all 
with my uncle — wondering what he was about ; whether 
he was very dull ; whether he wanted me much ; whether 
he was going about Paris, or haunting the moor that 
stretched far into the distance from where I lay. Per- 
haps at that moment he was out there in the moon- 
light, would be there alone, in the cold, wide night, 
while I slept ! The thought made me feel lonely my- 
self : one is indeed apt to feel lonely when sleepless ; 
and as the moon was having a night of it, or rather 
making a day of it, all alone with herself, why should 
we not keep each other a little company ? I rose, 
drew the other curtain of my window aside, and looked 
out. 

I have said that the house lay on the slope of a 
hollow : from whichever window of it you glanced, 
you saw the line of your private horizon either close 
to you, or but a little way off. If you wanted an out- 
look, you must climb : and then you were on the moor. 

From my window I could see the more distant 


230 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


edge of the hollow : looking thitherward, I saw against 
the sky the shape of a man on horseback. Not for a 
moment could I doubt it w T as my uncle. The figure 
was plainly his. My heart seemed to stand still with 
awe, or was it with intensity of gladness ? Perhaps 
every night he was *thus near me while I slept — a 
heavenly sentinel patrolling the house — the visible 
one of a whole camp unseen, of horses of fire and 
chariots of fire. So entrancing was the notion, that I 
stood there a little child, a mere incarnate love, the 
tears running down my cheeks for very bliss. 

But presently my mood changed : what had be- 
fallen him ? When first I saw him, horse and man 
were standing still, and I noted nothing strange, 
blinded perhaps by the tears of my gladness. But 
presently they moved on, keeping so to the horizon- 
line that it was plain my uncle’s object was to have 
the house full in view ; and as thus they skirted the 
edge of heaven, oh, how changed he seemed ! His 
tall figure hung bent over the pommel, his neck 
drooped heavily. And the horse was so thin that I 
seemed to see, almost to feel his bones. Poor Thana- 
tos ! he looked tired to death, and I fancied his bent 
knees quivering, each short slow step he took. Ah, 
how unlike the happy old horse that had been ! I 
thought of Death returning home weary from the 
slaughter of many kings, and cast the thought away. 


ONCE MORE, AND YET AGAIN. 


231 


I thought of Death returning home on the eve of the 
great dawn, worn with his age-long work, pleased that 
at .last it was over, and no more need of him : I kept 
that thought. Along the sky-line they held their slow 
way, toilsome through weakness, the rider with weary 
swing in the saddle, the horse with long gray neck 
hanging low to his hoofs, as if picking his path with 
purblind eyes. When his rider should collapse and 
fall from his back, not a .step farther would he take, 
but stand there till he fell to pieces ! 

Fancy gave way to reality. I woke up, called my- 
self hard names, and hurried on a few of my clothes. 
My blessed uncle out in the night and weary to dis- 
solution, and I at a window, contemplating him like a 
picture ! I was an evil, heartless brute ! 

By the time I had my shoes on, and went again to 
the window, he had passed out of its range. I ran to 
one on the stair that looked at right angles to mine : 
he had not yet come within its field. I stood and 
waited. Presently he appeared, crawling along, a 
gray mounted ghost, in the light that so strangely be- 
fits lovers wandering in the May of hope, and the 
wasted specter no less, whose imagination of the past 
reveals him to the eyes of men. For an instant I 
almost wished him dead and at rest ; the next I was 
out of the house— then up on the moor, looking 
eagerly this way and that, poised on the swift feet of 


232 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


love, ready to spring to his bosom. How I longed to 
lead him to his own warm bed, and watch by him as 
he slept, while the great Father kept watch over every 
heart in his universe. I gazed and gazed, but no- 
where could I see the death-jaded horseman. 

I bounded down the hill, through the wilderness 
and the dark alleys, and hurried to the stable. Trem- 
bling with haste I led Zoe out, sprang on her bare 
back, and darted off to scout the moor. Not a man 
or a horse or a live thing was to be seen in any direc- 
tion ! Once more I all but concluded I had looked on 
an apparition. Was my uncle dead ? Had he come 
back thus to let me know ? And was he now gone 
home indeed ? Cold and disappointed, I returned to 
bed, full of the conviction that I had seen my uncle, 
but whether in the body or out of the body, I could 
not tell. 

When John came, the notion of my having been 
out alone on the moor in the middle of the night, did 
not please him. He would have me promise not 
again, for any vision or apparition whatever, to leave 
the house without his company. But he could not 
persuade me. He asked what I would have done, if, 
having overtaken the horseman, I had found neither 
my uncle nor Death. I told him I would have given 
Zoe the use of her heels, when that horse would soon 
have seen the last of her. At the same time, he was 


ONCE MORE, AND YET AGAIN. 


233 


inclined to believe with me, that I had seen my uncle. 
His intended proximity would account, he said, for his 
making no arrangement to hear from me ; and if he 
continued to haunt the moor in such fashion, we could 
not fail to encounter him before long. In the mean 
time he thought it well to show no sign of suspecting 
his neighborhood. 

That I had seen my uncle, John was for a moment 
convinced when, the very next day, having gone to 
Wittenage, he saw Thanatos carrying Dr. Southwell, 
my uncle’s friend. On the other hand, Thanatos 
looked very much alive, and in lovely condition ! The 
doctor would not confess to knowing anything about 
my uncle, and expressed wonder that he had not yet 
returned, but said he did not mind how long he had 
the loan of such a horse. 

Things went on as before for a while. 

John began again to press me to marry him. I 
think it was mainly, I am sure it was in part, that I 
might never again ride the midnight moor — “ like a 
witch out on her own mischievous hook,” as he had 
once said. He knew that, if I caught sight of anything 
like my uncle anywhere, John or no John, I would go 
after it. 

There was another good reason, however, besides 
the absence of my uncle, for our not marrying: John 
was not yet of legal age, and who could tell what 


234 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


might not lurk in his mother’s threat ! Who could 
tell what such a woman might not have prevailed on 
her husband to set down in his will ! I was ready- 
enough to marry a poor man, but I was not ready to 
let my lover become a poor man by marrying me a 
few months sooner. Were we not happy enough, see- 
ing each other every day, and mostly all day long ? 
No doubt people talked, but why not let them talk ? 
The mind of the many is not the mind of God ! As to 
society, John called it an oyster of a divinity. He 
argued, however, that probably my uncle was keeping 
close until he saw us married. I answered that, if we 
were married, his mother would only be the more 
eager to have her revenge on us all, and my uncle the 
more careful of himself for our sakes. Anyhow, I 
said, I would not consent to be happier than we were, 
until we found him. The greater happiness I would 
receive only from his hand. 


CHAPTER XXXI. 


MY UNCLE COMES HOME. 

Time went on, and it was now the depth of a cold, 
miserable winter. I remember the day to which I 
have now come so well ! It was a black day. There 
was such a thickness of snow in the air, that what 
light got through had a lost look. It was almost 
more like a London fog than an honest darkness of 
the atmosphere, bred in its own bounds. But while 
the light lasted, the snow did not fall. I went about 
the house doing what I could find to do, and wonder- 
ing John did not come. 

His horse had again fallen lame — this time through 
an accident, which made it necessary for him to stay 
with the poor animal long after his usual time of 
starting to come to me. When he did start, it was on 
foot, with the short winter afternoon closing in. But 
he knew the moor by this time nearly as well as I did. 

It was quite dark when he drew near the house, 
which he generally entered through the wilderness and 
the garden. The snow had begun at last, and was 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


236 

coming down in deliberate earnest. It would lie feet 
deep over the moor before the morning ! He was 
thinking what a dreary tramp home it would be by 
the road — for the wind was threatening to wake, and 
in a snow-wind the moor was a place to be avoided — 
when he struck his foot against something soft, in the 
path his own feet had worn to the wilderness, and fell 
over it. A groan followed, and John rose with the 
miserable feeling of having hurt some creature. Drop- 
ping on his knees to discover what it was, he found a 
man almost covered with snow, and nearly insensible. 
He swept the snow off him, contrived to get him on 
his back, and brought him round to the door, for the 
fence would have been awkward to cross with him. 
Just as I began to be really uneasy at his prolonged 
absence, there he was, with a man on his back appar- 
ently lifeless ! 

I did not stop to stare or question, but made haste 
to help him. His burden was slipping sideways, so 
we lowered it on a chair, and then carried it between 
us into the kitchen, I holding the legs. The moment 
a ray of light fell upon the face, I saw it was my 
’uncle. 

I just saved myself from a scream. My heart 
stopped, then bumped as if it would break through. I 
turned sick and cold. We laid him on the sofa, but I 
still held on to the legs; I was half unconscious. 


MY UNCLE COMES HOME. 


237 


Martha set me on a chair, and in a moment or two I 
came to myself, and was able to help her. She said 
never a word, but was quite collected, looking every 
now and then in the face of her cousin with a dog-like 
devotion, but never stopping an instant to gaze. We 
got him some brandy first, then some hot milk, and 
then some soup. He took a little of everything we 
offered him. We did not ask him a single question, 
but, the moment he revived, carried him up the stair, 
and laid him in bed. Once he cast his eye about, and 
gave a sigh as of relief to find himself in his own 
room, then went off into a light doze, which, broken 
with starts and half-wakings, lasted until next day 
about noon. Either John or Martha or I was by his 
bedside all the time, so that he should not wake with- 
out seeing one of us near him. 

But the sad thing was, that, when he did wake, he 
did not seem to come to himself. He never spoke, 
but just lay and looked out of his eyes, if indeed it 
was more chan his eyes that looked, if indeed he looked 
out of them at all ! 

“ He has overdone his strength ! ” we said to each 
other. “ He has not been taking care of himself ! — 
And then to have lain perhaps hours in the snow ! 
It’s a wonder he's alive ! ” 

“ He's nothing but skin and bone ! ” said Martha. 
“ It will take weeks to get him up again ! — And just 


238 THE flight of the shadow. 

look at his clothes ! How ever did he come nigh 
such ! They’re fit only for a beggar ! They must 
have knocked him down and stripped him ! — Look at 
his poor boots!” she said pitifully, taking up one of 
them, and stroking it with her hand. “ He’ll never 
recover it ! ” 

“ He will,” I said. “ Here are three of us to give 
him of our life ! He’ll soon be himself again, now 
that we have him ! ” 

But my heart was like to break at the sad sight. 
I can not put in words what I felt. 

“ He would get well much quicker,” said John, “if 
only we could tell him we were married ! ” 

“ It will do just as well to invite him to the wed- 
ding,” I answered. 

“ I do hope he will give you away,” said Martha. 

“ He will never give me away,” I returned ; “ but 
he will give me to John. And I will not have the 
wedding until he is able to do that.” 

“You are right,” said John. “And we mustn’t ask 
him anything, or even refer to anything, till he wants 
to hear.” 

Days went and came, and still he did not seem to 
know quite where he was ; if he did know, he seemed 
so content with knowing it, that he did not want to 
know anything more in heaven or earth. We grew 
very anxious about him. He did not heed a word that 


MY UNCLE COMES HOME. 


239 

Dr. Southwell said. His mind seemed as exhausted as 
his body. The doctor justified John’s resolve, saying 
he must not be troubled with questions, or the least 
attempt to rouse his memory. 

John was now almost constantly with us. One day 
I asked him whether his mother took any notice of his 
being now so seldom home at night. He answered 
she did not ; and, but for being up to her ways, he 
would imagine she knew nothing at all about his do- 
ings. 

“ What does she do herself all day long ? ” I asked. 

“ Goes over her books, I imagine,” he answered. 
“ She knows the hour is at hand when she must render 
account of her stewardship, and I suppose she is get- 
ting ready to meet it; — how, I would rather not con- 
jecture. She gives me no trouble now, and I have no 
wish to trouble her.” 

“ Have you no hope of ever being on filial terms 
with her again ? ” I said. 

“ There can be few things more unlikely,” he re- 
plied. 

I was a little troubled, notwithstanding my knowl- 
edge of her and my feeling toward her, that he should 
regard a complete alienation from his mother with 
such indifference. I could not, however, balance the 
account between them ! If she had a strong claim in 
the sole fact that she was his mother, how much had 


240 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


she not injured him simply by not being lovable! 
Love unpaid is the worst possible debt ; and to make 
it impossible to pay it, is the worst of wrongs. 

But, oh, what a heart-oppression it was, that my 
uncle had returned so different ! We were glad to 
have him, but how gladly would we not have let him 
go again to restore him to himself, even were it never 
more to rest our eyes upon him in this world ! Dearly 
as I loved John, it seemed as if nothing could make 
me happy while my uncle remained as he was. It 
was a kind of cold despair to know him such impass- 
able miles from me. I could not get near him ! I 
went about all day with a sense not merely of loss, 
but of a loss that gnawed at me with a sickening pain. 
He never spoke. He never said little one to me now ! 
He never looked in my eyes as if he loved me! He 
was very gentle, never complained, never even frowned, 
but lay there with a dead question in his eyes. We 
feared his mind was utterly gone. 

By degrees his health returned, but apparently 
neither his memory, nor his interest in life. Yet he 
had a far-away look in his eyes, as if he remembered 
something, and started and turned at every opening 
of the door, as if he expected something. He took 
to wandering about the yard and the stable and 
the cow-house; would gaze for an hour at some 
animal in its stall ; would watch the men thrash- 


MY UNCLE COMES HOME. 


24I 


in g the corn, or twisting straw-ropes. When Dr. 
Southwell sent back his horse, it was in great hope 
that the sight of Death would wake him up ; that 
he would recognize his old companion, jump on 
his back, and be well again ; but my uncle only 
looked at him with a faint admiration, went round him 
and examined him as if he were a horse he thought 
of buying, then turned away and left him. Death 
w T as troubled at his treatment of him. He on his part 
showed him all the old attention, using every equine 
blandishment he knew but having met with no re- 
sponse, he too turned slowly away, and walked to his 
stable. Dr. Southwell would gladly have bought him, 
but neither John nor I would hear of parting with 
him : he was almost a portion of his master ! My 
uncle might come to himself any moment : how could 
we look him in the face if Death was gone from us! 
Besides, we loved the horse for his own sake as well as 
my uncle’s, and John would be but too glad to ride him ! 

My uncle would wander over the house, up and 
down, but seemed to prefer the little drawing-room : I 
made it my special business to keep a good fire there. 
He never went to the study ; never opened the door 
in the chimney-corner. He very seldom spoke, and 
seldomer to me than to any other. It was a dreary 
time ! Our very souls had longed for him back, and 
thus he came to us ! 


242 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


Sorely I wept over the change that had passed 
upon the good man. He must have received some 
terrible shock! It was just as if his mother, John 
said, had got hold of him, and put a knife in his heart ! 
It was well, however, that he was not wandering about 
the heath, exposed to the elements ! and there was yet 
time for many a good thing to come ! Where one 
must wait, one can wait 

John had to learn this, for, say what he would, the 
idea of marrying while my uncle remained in such 
plight, was to me unendurable. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 


TWICE TWO IS ONE. 

The spring came, but brought little change in the 
condition of my uncle. In the month of May, Dr. 
Southwell advised our taking him abroad. When we 
proposed it to him, he passed his hand wearily over 
his forehead, as if he felt something wrong there, and 
gave us no reply. We made our preparations, and 
when the day arrived, he did not object to go. 

We were an odd party: John and I, bachelor and 
spinster; my uncle, a silent, moody man, who did 
whatever we asked him ; and the still, open-eyed Mar- 
tha Moon, who, I sometimes think, understood more 
about it all than any of us. I could talk a little 
French, John a good deal of German. When we got 
to Paris, we found my uncle considerably at home 
there. When he cared to speak, he spoke like a na- 
tive, and was never at a loss for word or phrase. 

It was he, indeed, whc took us to a quiet little 
hotel he knew ; and when we were comfortably settled 
in it, he began to take the lead in all our plans. By 


244 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 




degrees he assumed the care and guidance of the 
whole party : and so well did he carry out what he 
had silently, perhaps almost unconsciously undertaken, 
that we conceived the greatest hopes of the result to 
himself. A mind might lie quiescent so long as it was 
ministered to, and hedged from cares and duties, but 
wake up when something was required of it ! No one 
would have thought anything amiss with my uncle, 
that heard him giving his orders for the day, or act- 
ing cicerone to the little company — there for his sake, 
though he did not know it. How often John and I 
looked at each other, and how glad were our hearts ! 
My uncle was fast coming to himself ! It was like 
watching the dead grow alive. 

One day he proposed taking a carriage and a good 
pair of horses, and driving to Versailles to see the 
palace. We agreed, and all went well. I had not, in 
my wildest dreams, imagined a place so grand and 
beautiful. We wandered about it for hours, and were 
just tired enough to begin thinking with pleasure of 
the start homeward, when we found ourselves in a 
very long, straight corridor. I was walking alone, a 
little ahead of the rest ; my uncle was coming along 
next, but a good way behind me ; a few paces behind 
my uncle came John with Martha, to whom he was 
more scrupulously attentive than to myself. 

In front of me was a door, dividing the corridor in 


TWICE TWO IS ONE. 


245 


two, apparently filled with plain plate-glass, to break 
the draught without obscuring the effect of the great 
length of the corridor, which stretched away as far on 
the other side as we had come on this. I paused and 
stood aside, leaning against the wall to wait for my 
uncle, and gazing listlessly out of a window opposite 
me. But as my uncle came nearer to open the door 
for us, I happened to cast my eyes again upon it, and 
saw, as it seemed, my uncle coming in the opposite 
direction ; whence I concluded, of course, that I had 
made a mistake, and that what J had taken for a clear 
plate of glass, was a mirror, reflecting the corridor be- 
hind me. I looked back at my uncle with a little 
anxiety. My reader may remember that, when he 
came to fetch me from Rising, the day after I was 
lost on the moor, encountering a mirror at unawares, 
he started and nearly fell : from this occurrence, and 
from the absence of mirrors about the house, I had 
imagined in his life some painful story connected with 
a mirror. 

Once again I saw him start, and then stand like 
stone. Almost immediately a marvelous light over- 
spread his countenance, and with a cry he bounded 
forward. I looked again at the mirror, and there I 
saw the self-same light-irradiated countenance coming 
straight, as was natural, to meet that of which it was 
the reflection. Then all at once the solid foundations 


246 THE flight of the shadow. 

of fact seemed to melt into vaporous dream, for as I 
saw the two figures come together, the one in the mir- 
ror, the other in the world, and was starting forward 
to prevent my uncle from shattering the mirror and 
wounding himself, the figures fell into each other’s 
arms, and I heard two voices weeping and sobbing, as 
the substance and the shadow embraced. 

Two men had for a moment been deceived like 
myself : neither glass nor mirror was there — only the 
frame from which a swing-door had been removed. 
They walked each into the arms of the other, whom 
they had at first each taken for himself. 

They paused in their weeping, held each other at 
arm’s-length, and gazed as in mute appeal for yet 
better assurance ; then, smiling like two suns from 
opposing rain-clouds, fell again each on the other’s 
neck, and wept anew. Neither had killed the other! 
Neither had lost the other ! The world had been a 
grave-yard ; it was a paradise ! 

We stood aside in reverence. Martha Moon’s eyes 
glowed, but she manifested no surprise. John and I 
stared in utter bewilderment. The two embraced each 
other, kissed and hugged and patted each other, wept 
and murmured and laughed, then all at once, with one 
great sigh between them, grew aware of witnesses. 
They were too happy to blush, yet indeed they could 
not have blushed, so red were they with the fire of 


TWICE TWO IS ONE. 


247 


heaven’s own delight. Utterly unembarrassed they 
turned toward us — and then came a fresh astonish- 
ment, an old and new joy together out of the treasure 
of the divine householder : the uncle of the mirror, 
radiant with a joy such as I had never before beheld 
upon human countenance, came straight to me, cried, 
“ Ah, little one ! ” took me in his arms, and embraced 
me with all the old tenderness. Then I knew that my 
own old uncle was the same as ever I had known him, 
the same as when I used to go to sleep in his arms. 

The jubilation that followed it is impossible for 
me to describe ; and my husband, who approves of all 
I have yet written, begs me not to attempt an adum- 
bration of it. 

“ It would be a pity,” he says, “ to end a won face 
with a tumble-down at the post ! ” 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 


HALF ONE IS ONE. 

I am going to give you the whole story, but not 
this moment; I want to talk a little first. I need not 
say that I had twin uncles. They were but one man 
to the world ; to themselves only were they a veritable 
two. The word twin means one of two that once 
were one. To twin means to divide , they tell me. The 
opposite action is, of twain to make one. To me as 
well as the world, I believe, but for the close indi- 
vidual contact of all my life with my uncle Edward, 
the two would have been but as one man. I hardly 
know that I felt any richer at first for having two 
uncles; it was long before I should have felt much 
poorer for the loss of uncle Edmund. Uncle Edward 
was to me the substance of which uncle Edmund was 
the shadow. But at length I learned to love him 
dearly through perceiving how dearly my own uncle 
loved him. I loved the one because he was what he 
was, the other because he was not that one. Creative 
Love commonly differentiates that it may unite ; in the 


HALF ONE IS ONE. 


249 


case of my uncles it seemed only to have divided that 
it might unite. I am hardly intelligible to myself; in 
my mind at least I have got into a bog of confused 
metaphysics, out of which it is time I scrambled. 
What I would say is this — that what made the world 
not care there should be two of them, made the earth 
a heaven to those two. By their not being one, they 
were able to love, and so were one. Like twin planets 
they revolved around each other, and in a common 
orbit around God their sun. It was a beautiful thing 
to see how uncle Edmund revived and expanded in 
the light of his brother’s presence, until he grew 
plainly himself. He had suffered more than my own 
uncle, and had not had an orphan child to love and 
be loved by. 

What a drive home that was ! Paris, anywhere 
seemed home now ! 1 had John and my uncles ; John 

had me and my uncle; my uncles had each other; and 
I suspect, if we could have looked into Martha, we 
should have seen that she, through her lovely unself- 
ishness, possessed us all more than any one of us 
another. Oh the outbursts of gladness on the way ! — 
the talks ! — the silences ! The past fell off like an ugly 
veil from the true face of things ; the present was sun- 
shine ; the future a rosy cloud. 

When we reached our hotel it was dinner-time, 
and John ordered champagne. He and I were hungry 


250 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


as two happy children ; the brothers ate little, and 
scarcely drank. They were too full of each other to 
have room for any animal need. A strange solemnity 
crowned and dominated their gladness. Each was to 
the other a Lazarus given back from the grave. But 
to understand the depth of their rapture, you must 
know their story. That of Martha and Mary and 
Lazarus could not have equaled it but for the pres- 
ence of the Master, for neither sisters nor brother had 
done each other any wrong. They looked to me like 
men walking in a luminous mist — a mist of unspeakable 
suffering radiant with a joy as unspeakable — the very 
stuff to fashion into glorious dreams. 

When we drew round the fire, for the evenings 
were chilly, they laid their whole history open to us. 
What a tale it was ! and what a telling of it ! My own 
uncle Edward, was the principal narrator, but was oc- 
casionally helped out by my newer uncle, Edmund. 
I had the story already, my reader will remember, in 
my uncle’s writing, at home : when we returned I read 
it — not with the same absorption as if it had come 
first, but with as much interest, and certainly with the 
more thorough comprehension that I had listened to 
it before. That same written story I shall presently 
give, supplemented by what, necessarily, my uncle 
Edmund had to supply, and with some elucidation 
from the spoken narrative of my uncle Edward. 


HALF ONE IS ONE. 


251 


As the story proceeded, overcome with the horror 
of the revelation I foresaw, I forgot myself and cried 
out — 

“ And that woman is John’s mother ! ” 

“Whose mother?” asked uncle Edmund, with 
scornful curiosity. 

John Day’s,” I answered. 

“ It can not be ! ” he cried, blazing up. “ Are you 
sure of it ? ” 

“I have always been given so to understand,” re- 
plied John for me; “but I am by no means sure of it. 
I have doubted it a thousand times.” 

“ No wonder ! Then we may go on ! But, indeed, 
to believe you her son, would be to doubt you! I 
don't believe it.” 

“ You could not help doubting me ! ” responded 
John. “ — I might be true, though, even if I were her 
son ! ” he added. 

“ Ed,” said Edmund to Edward, “ let us lay our 
heads together ! ” 

“ Ready, Ed ! ” said Edward to Edmund. 

Thereupon they began comparing memories and 
recollections — to find, however, that they had by no 
means data enough. One thing was clear to me — that 
nothing would be too bad for them to believe of 
her. 

“ She would pick out the eye of a corpse if she 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


252 

thought a sovereign lay behind it ! ” said uncle Ed- 
mund. 

“ To have the turning over of his rents — ” said 
uncle Edward, and checked himself. 

“ Yes — it would be just one of her devil-tricks ! ” 
agreed uncle Edmund. 

“I beg your pardon, John,” said uncle Edward, as 
if it were he that had used the phrase, and uncle Ed- 
mund nodded to John, as if he had himself made the 
apology. 

John said nothing. His eyes looked wild with hope. 
He felt like one who, having been taught that he is a 
child of the devil, begins to know that God is his 
father — the one discovery worth making by son of 
man. 

Then, at my request, they went on with their story, 
which I had interrupted. 

When it was at length all poured out, and the last 
drops shaken from the memory of each, there fell a 
long silence, which my own uncle broke. 

“ When shall we start, Ed ? ” he said. 

“ To-morrow, Ed.” 

“ This business of John’s must come first, Ed ! ” 

“ It shall, Ed ! ” 

“ You know where you were born, John ?” 

“ On my father’s estate of Rubworth in Gloucester- 
shire, I believe ,” answered John. 


HALF ONE IS ONE. 


253 


“ You must be prepared for the worst, you know ! ” 

“ I am prepared. As' Orba told me once, God is 
my father, whoever my mother may be ! ” 

“ That’s right. Hold by that ! ” said my uncles, as 
with one breath. 

“ Do you know the year you were born ? ” asked 
uncle Edmund. 

“ My mother says I was born in 1820.’’ 

“ You have not seen the entry ? ” 

“No. One does not naturally doubt such state- 
ments.” 

“ Assuredly not — until- — ” 

He paused. 

How uncle Edmund had regained his wits ! And 
how young the brothers looked ! 

“You mean,” said John, “until he has known my 
mother ! ” 

Now for the story of my twin uncles, mainly as 
written by my uncle Edward ! 


CHAPTER XXXI 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 

“ My brother and I were marvelously like. Very 
few of our friends, none of them with certainty, could 
name either of us apart — or even together. Only two 
persons knew absolutely which either of us was, and 
those two were ourselves. Our mother certainly did 
not — at least without seeing one or other of our backs. 
Even we ourselves have each made the blunder occa- 
sionally of calling the other by the wrong name. Our 
indistinguishableness was the source of ever-recurring 
mistake, of constant amusement, of frequent bewilder- 
ment, and sometimes of annoyance in the family. I 
once heard my father say to a friend, that God had 
never made two things alike, except his twins. We 
two enjoyed the fun of it so much, that we did our 
best to increase the confusions resulting from our re- 
semblance. We did not lie, but we dodged and pre- 
tended, questioned and looked mysterious, till I verily 
believe the person concerned, having in himself so 
vague an idea of our individuality, not unfrequently 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


255 

forgot which he had blamed, or which he had wanted, 
and became hopelessly muddled. 

“ A man might well have started the question 
what good could lie in the existence of a duality 
in which the appearance was, if not exactly, yet so 
nearly identical, that no one but my brother or myself 
could have pointed out definite differences ; but it 
could have been started only by an outsider : my 
brother and I had no doubt concerning the advan- 
tage of a duality in which each was the other’s dou- 
ble ; the fact was to us a never-ceasing source of de- 
light. Each seemed to the other created such, express- 
ly that he might love him as a special, individual prop- 
erty of his own. It was as if the image of Narcissus 
had risen bodily out of the watery mirror, to be what 
it had before but seemed. It was as if we had been 
made two, that each might love himself, and yet not 
be selfish. 

“We were almost always together, but sometimes 
we got into individual scrapes, when — which will ap- 
pear to some incredible — the one accused always ac- 
cepted punishment without denial or subterfuge or 
attempt to perplex : it was all one which was the cul- 
prit, and which should be the sufferer. Nor did this 
indistinction work badly : that the other was just as 
likely to suffer as the doer of the wrong, wrought 
rather as a deterrent. The mode of behavior may 


256 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


have had its origin in the instinctive perception of the 
impossibility of proving innocence ; but had we, lov- 
ing as we did, been capable of truthfully accusing 
each other, I think we should have been capable of 
lying also. The delight of existence lay, embodied 
and objective to each, in the existence of the 
other. 

“At school we learned the same things, and only 
long after did any differences in taste begin to de- 
velop themselves. 

“Our brother, elder by five years, who would suc- 
ceed to the property, had the education my father 
thought would best fit him for the management of 
land. We twins were trained to be lawyer and doctor 
— I the doctor. 

“ We went to college together, and shared the same 
rooms. 

“ Having finished our separate courses, our father 
sent us to a German university : he would not have 
us insular ! 

“ There we did not work hard, nor was hard work 
required of us. We went out a good deal in the 
evenings, for the students that lived at home in the 
town were hospitable. We seemed to be rather popu- 
lar, owing probably to our singular likeness, which we 
found was regarded as a serious disadvantage. The 
reason of this opinion we never could find, flattering 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


257 

ourselves indeed that what it typified gave us each 
double the base and double the strength. 

“ We had all our friends in common. Every friend 
to one of us was a friend to both. If one met man or 
woman he was pleased with, he never rested until the 
other knew that man or woman also. Our delight in 
our friends must have been greater than that of other 
men, because of the constant sharing. 

“ Our all but identity of form, our inseparability, 
our unanimity, and our mutual devotion, were often, 
although we did not know it, a subject of talk in the 
social gatherings of the place. It was more than once 
or twice openly mooted — what, in the chances of life, 
would be likeliest to strain the bond that united us. 
Not a few agreed that a terrible catastrophe might 
almost be expected from what they considered such 
an unnatural relation. 

“ I think you must already be able to foresee from 
what the first difference between us would arise : dis- 
cord itself was rooted in the very unison — for unison 
it was, not harmony — of our tastes and instincts ; and 
will now begin to understand why it was so difficult, 
indeed impossible, for me not to have a secret from 
my little one. 

“ Among the persons we met in the home-circles of 
our fellow-students, appeared by and by an English 
lady — a young widow, they said, though little in her 
.19 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


258 

dress or carriage suggested widowhood. We met 
her again and again. Each thought her the most 
beautiful woman he had ever seen, but neither was 
much interested in her at first. Nor do I believe 
either would, of himself, ever have been. Our likings 
and dislikings always hitherto had gone together, and, 
left to themselves, would have done so always, I 
believe ; whence it seems probable that, left to 
ourselves, we should also have found, when required, 
a common strength of abnegation. But in the present 
case, our feelings were not left to themselves ; the 
lady gave the initiative, and the dividing regard was 
born in the one, and had time to establish itself, ere 
the provoking influence was brought to bear on the 
other. 

“ Within the last few years I have had a visit from 
an old companion of the period. I dare say you will 
remember the German gentleman who amused you 
with the funny way in which he pronounced certain 
words — one of the truest-hearted and truest-tongued 
men I have ever known: he gave me much unexpected 
insight into the evil affair. He had learned certain 
things from a sister, the knowledge of which, old as 
the story they concerned by that time was, chiefly 
moved his coming to England to find me. 

“ One evening, he told me, when a number of the 
ladies we were in the habit of meeting happened to be 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


259 


together without any gentleman present, the talk 
turned, half in a philosophical, half in a gossipy spirit, 
upon the consequences that might follow, should two 
men, bound in such strange fashion as my brother 
and I, fall in love with the same woman — a thing not 
merely possible, but to be expected. The talk, my 
friend said, was full of a certain speculative sort of 
metaphysics, which in the present state of human de- 
velopment is far from healthy, both because of our 
incompleteness, and because we are too near to what 
we seem to know, to judge it aright. One lady was 
present — a lady by us more admired and trusted than 
any of the rest — who alone declared a conviction that 
love of no woman would ever separate us, provided 
the one fell in love first, and the other knew the fact 
before he saw the lady. For, she said, no jealousy 
would in that case be roused ; and the relation of the 
brother to his brother and sister would be so close as 
to satisfy his heart. In a few days probably he too 
would fall in love, and his lady in like manner be re- 
ceived by his brother, when they would form a square 
impregnable to attack. The theory was a good one, 
and worthy of realization. But, alas, the Prince of 
the Power of the Air was already present in force, in 
the heart of the English widow ! Young in years, but 
old in pride and self-confidence, she smiled at the 
notion of our advocate. She said that the idea of 


26 o the flight of the shadow. 

any such friendship between men was nonsense ; that 
she knew more about men than some present could be 
expected to know : their love was but a matter of 
custom and use ; the moment self took part in the 
play, it would burst ; it was but a bubble company ! 
As for love proper — she meant the love between man 
and woman — its law was the opposite to that of 
friendship ; its birth and continuance depended on the 
parties not getting accustomed to each other ; the less 
they knew each other, the more they would love each 
other. 

“ Upon this followed much confused talk, during 
which the English lady declared nothing easier than 
to prove friendship, or the love of brothers, the kind 
of thing she had said. 

“ Most of the company believed the young widow 
but talking to show off ; while not a few felt that 
they desired no nearer acquaintance with one whose 
words, whatever might be her thoughts, degraded 
humanity. The circle was very speedily broken into 
two segments, one that liked the English lady, and 
one that almost hated her. 

“ From that moment, the English widow set before 
her the devil-victory of alienating two hearts that 
loved each other — and she gained it for a time — until 
Death proved stronger than the Devil. People said 
we could not be parted: she would part us ! She be- 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 261 


gan with my brother. To tell how I know that she 
began with him, I should have to tell how she began 
with me, and that I can not do ; for, little one, I dare 
not let the tale of the treacheries of a bad woman to- 
ward an unsuspecting youth enter your ears. Suffice it 
to say, such a woman has well studied those regions 
of a man’s nature into which, being less divine, the 
devil in her can easier find entrance. There, she 
knows him better than he knows himself ; and makes 
use of her knowledge, not to elevate but to degrade 
him. She fills him with herself, and her animal influ- 
ences. She gets into his self-consciousness beside 
himself, by means of his self-love. Through the ever- 
open funnel of his self-greed, she pours in flattery. 
By depreciation of others she hints admiration of him- 
self. By the slightest motion of a finger, of an eyelid, 
of her person, she will pay him a homage of which 
first he can not, then he will not, then he dares not 
doubt the truth. Not such a woman only, but almost 
any silly woman, may speedily make the most ordi- 
nary, and hitherto modest youth, imagine himself the 
pink of creation, the triumph of the Deity. No man 
alive is beyond the danger of imagining himself ex- 
ceptional among men : if such as think well of them- 
selves were right in so doing, truly the world were ill 
worth God’s making ! He is the wisest who has 
learned to ‘ be naught a while ! ’ The silly soul becomes 


262 THE flight of the shadow. 

so full of his tempter, and of himself in and through 
her, that he loses interest in all else, cares for nobody 
but her, prizes nothing but her regard, broods upon 
nothing but her favors, looks forward to nothing but 
again her presence and further favors. God is no- 
where ; fellow-man in the way like a buzzing fly — else 
no more to be regarded than a speck of dust neither 
upon his person nor his garment. And this terrible 
disintegration of life rises out of the most wonder- 
ful, mysterious, beautiful, and profound relation in 
humanity ! Its roots go down into the very deeps 
of God, and out of its foliage creeps the old serpent, 
and the worm that never dies ! Out of it steams the 
horror of corruption, wrapped in whose living death a 
man cries out that God himself can do nothing for 
him. It is but the natural result of his making the 
loveliest of God’s gifts into his God, and worshiping 
and serving the creature more than the Creator. Oh 
my child, it is a terrible thing to be ! Except he 
knows God the Saviour, man stands face to face with 
a torturing enigma, hopeless of solution ! 

“ The woman sought and found the enemy, my 
false self, in the house of my life. To that she gave 
herself, as if she gave herself to me. Oh, how she 
made me love her ! — if that be love which is a deifica- 
tion of self, the foul worship of one’s own paltry 
being ! — and that when most it seems swallowed up 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 263 

and lost! No, it is not love! Does love make 
ashamed ? The memories of it may be full of pain, 
but can the soul ever turn from love with sick con- 
tempt ? That which at length is loathed, can never 
have been loved ! 

“Of my brother she would speak as of a poor 
creature not for a moment to be compared with my- 
self. How I could have believed her true when she 
spoke thus, knowing that in the mirror I could not 
have told myself from my brother, knowing also that 
our minds, tastes, and faculties bore as strong a re- 
semblance as our bodies, I can not tell, but she fooled 
me to a fool through the indwelling folly of my self- 
love. At other times, wishing to tighten the bonds of 
my thralldom that she might the better work her evil 
end, proving herself a powerful devil, she would rouse 
my jealousy by some sign of strong admiration of Ed- 
mund. She must have acted the same way with my 
brother. I saw him enslaved just as I — knew we were 
faring alike — knew the very thoughts as well as feel- 
ings in his heart, and instead of being consumed with 
sorrow, chuckled at the knowledge that I was the fa- 
vored one ! I suspect now that she showed him more 
favor than myself, and taught him to put on the look 
of the hopeless one. I fancied I caught at times a 
* covert flash in his eye : he knew what he knew ! If so, 
poor Edmund, thou hadst the worst of it every way ! 


264 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ Shall I ever get her kisses off my lips, her poison 
out of my brain ! From my heart, her image was 
burned in a moment, as utterly as if by years of 
hell! 

“ The estrangement between us was sudden ; there 
were degrees only in the widening of it. First came 
embarrassment at meeting. Then, all commerce of 
wish, thought, and speculation ended. There was no 
more merrymaking jugglery with identity ; each was 
himself only, and for himself alone. Gone was all 
brother-gladness. We avoided each other more and 
more. When we must meet, we made haste to part. 
Heaven was gone from home. Each yet felt the same 
way toward the other, but it was the way of repelling, 
not drawing. When we passed in the street, it was 
with a look that said, or at least meant — ‘You are my 
brother! I don’t want you!’ We ceased even to nod 
to each other. Still in our separation we could not 
separate. Each took a room in another part of the 
town, but under the same pseudonym. Our common 
lodging was first deserted, then formally given up by 
each. Always what one did, that did the other, 
though no longer intending to act in concert with 
him. He could not help it though he tried, for the 
other tried also, and did the same thing. One of us 
might for months have played the part of both with- ' 
out detection — especially if it had been understood 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 265 

that we had parted company ; but I think it was 
never suspected, although now we were rarely for a 
moment together, and still more rarely spoke. A 
few weeks sufficed to bring us to the verge of mad- 
ness. 

“To this day I doubt if the woman, our common 
disease, knew the one of us from the other. That in 
any part of her being there was the least approach to 
a genuine womanly interest in either of us, I do not 
believe. I am very sure she never cared for me. 
Preference I can not think possible; she could not, 
it seems to me, have felt anything for one of us with- 
out feeling the same for both ; I do not see how, with 
all she knew of us, we could have made two impres- 
sions upon her moral sensorium. 

“ It was at length the height of summer, and every 
one sought change of scene and air. It was time for 
us to go home ; but I wrote to my father, and got 
longer leave.” 

“I wrote too,” interposed my uncle Edmund at 
this point of the story, when my own uncle was telling 
it that evening in Paris. 

“ The day after the date of his answer to my letter, 
my father died. But Edmund and I were already on 
our way, by different routes, to the mountain-village 
whither the lady had preceded us ; and having, in our 
infatuation, left no address, my brother never saw 


266 THE flight of the shadow. 

the letter announcing our loss, and I not for 
months. 

“ A few weeks more, and our elder brother, who 
had always been delicate, followed our father. This 
also remained for a time unknown to me. My mother 
had died many years before, and we had now scarce 
a relation in the world. Martha Moon is the nearest 
relative you and I have. Besides her and you, there 
were left therefore of the family but myself and your 
uncle Edmund — both absorbed in the same worthless 
woman. 

“ At the village there were two hostelries. I 
thought my brother would go to the better; he 
thought I would go to the better ; so we met at the 
worse ! I remember a sort of grin on his face when 
we saw each other, and have no doubt the same grin 
was on mine. We always did the same thing, just as 
of old. The next morning we set out, I need hardly 
say each by himself, to find the lady. 

She had rented a small chalet on the banks of a 
swift mountain-stream, and thither, for a week or so, 
we went every day, often encountering. The efforts 
we made to avoid each other being similar and simul- 
taneous, they oftener resulted in our meeting. When 
one did nothing, the other generally did nothing also, 
and when one schemed the other also schemed, and 
similarly. Thus what had been the greatest pleasure 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 2 67 

of our peculiar relation, our mental and moral resem- 
blance, namely, became a large factor in our mutual 
hate. For with self-loathing shame, and a misery 
that makes me curse the day I was born, I confess 
that for a time I hated the brother of my heart ; and 
I have but too good ground for believing that he also 
hated me ! ” 

“ I did ! I did ! ” cried uncle Edmund, when my 
own uncle, in his verbal narrative, mentioned his be- 
lief that his brother hated him ; whereupon uncle Ed- 
ward turned to me, saying : 

“ Is it not terrible, my little one, that out of a pas- 
sion called by the same name with that which binds 
you and John Day, the hellish smoke of such a hate 
should arise ! God must understand it ! that is a com- 
fort : in vain I seek to sound it. Even then I knew 
that I dwelt in an evil house. Amid the highest of such 
hopes as the woman roused in me, I scented the va- 
pors of the pit. I was haunted by the dim shape of 
the coming hour when I should hate the woman that 
enthralled me, more than ever I had loved her. The 
greater sinner I am, that I yet yielded her dominion 
over mp. I was the willing slave of a woman who 
sought nothing but the consciousness of power ; who, 
to the indulgence of that vilest of passions, would 
sacrifice the lives, the loves, the very souls of men ! 
She lived to separate, where Jesus died to make one. 


268 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


How weak and unworthy was I to be canght in her 
snares ! how wicked and vile not to tear myself loose 1 
The woman whose touch would defile the Pharisee, is 
pure beside such a woman ! ” 

I return to his manuscript. 

“ The lady must have had plenty of money, and 
she loved company and show ; I can not but think, 
therefore, that she had her design in choosing such a 
solitary place : its loveliness would subserve her intent 
of enthralling thoroughly heart and soul and brain of 
the fools she had in her toils. I doubt, however, if 
the fools were alive to any beauty but hers, if they 
were not dead to the wavings of God’s garment about 
them. Was I ever truly aware of the presence of 
those peaks that dwelt alone with their whiteness in 
the desert of the sky — awfully alone — of the world, 
but not with the world ? I think we saw nothing save 
with our bodily eyes, and very little with them ; for 
we were blinded by a passion fitter to wander the halls 
of Eblis, than the palaces of God. 

“ The chalet stood in a little valley, high in the 
mountains, whose surface was gently undulating, with 
here and there the rocks breaking through its rich- 
flowering meadows. Down the middle of it ran the 
deep swift stream, swift with the weight of its fullness 
as well as the steep slope of its descent. It was not 
more than seven or eight feet across, but a great body 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 269 

of water went rushing along its deep course. About a 
quarter of a mile from the chalet, it reached the first 
of a series of falls of moderate height and slope, after 
which it divided into a number of channels, mostly 
shallow, in a wide pebbly torrent-bed. These, a little 
lower down, reunited into a narrower and yet swifter 
stream — a small fierce river, which presently, at one 
reckless bound, shot into the air, to tumble to a valley 
a thousand feet below, shattered into spray as it fell. 

“ The chalet stood alone. The village was at no 
great distance, but not a house was visible from any 
of its windows. It had no garden. The meadow, one 
blaze of color, softened by the green of the mingling 
grass, came up to its wooden walls, and stretched 
from them down to the rocky bank of the river, in many 
parts to the very water’s edge. The chalet stood like 
a yellow rock in a green sea. The meadow was the 
drawing-room where the lady generally received us. 

“ One lovely evening, I strolled out of the hostelry, 
and went walking up the road that led to the village 
of Auerbach, so named from the stream and the 
meadow I have described. The moon was up, and 
promised the loveliest night. I was in no haste, for 
the lady had, in our common hearing, said, she was 
going to pass that night with a friend, in a town some 
ten miles away. I dawdled along, therefore, thinking 
only to greet the place, walk with the stream, and lie 


270 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


in the meadow, sacred with the shadow of her demo- 
nian presence. Quit of the restless hope of seeing her, 
I found myself taking some little pleasure in the 
things about me, and spent two hours on the way, 
amid the sound of rushing water, now swelling, now 
sinking, all the time. 

“ It had not crossed me to wonder where my 
brother might be. I banished the thought of him as 
often as it intruded. Not able to help meeting, we 
had almost given up avoiding each other ; but when 
we met, our desire was to part. I do not know that, 
apart, we had ever yet felt actual hate, either to the 
other. 

u The road led through the village. It was asleep. 
I remember a gleam in just one of the houses. The 
moonlight seemed to have drowned all the lamps of 
the world. I came to the stream, rushing cold from 
its far-off glacier-mother, crossed it, and went down 
the bank opposite the chalet : I had taken a fancy to 
see it from that side. Glittering and glancing under 
the moon, the wild little river rushed joyous to its 
fearful fall. A short distance away, it was even now 
falling — falling from off the face of the world ! This 
moment it was falling from my very feet into the void 
— falling, falling, unupheld, down, down, through the 
moonlight, to the ghastly rock-foot below ! 

“ The chalet seemed deserted. With the same 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


271 

wofully desolate look, it constantly comes back in 
my dreams. I went farther down the valley. The 
full-rushing stream went with me like a dog. It made 
no murmur, only a low gurgle as it shot along. It 
seemed to draw me with it to its last leap. As I 
looked at its swiftness, I thought how hard it would 
be to get out of. The swiftness of it comes to me yet 
in my dreams. 

“ I came to a familiar rock, which, part of the bank 
whereon I walked, rose some six or seven feet above 
the meadow, just opposite a little hollow where the 
lady oftenest sat. Two were on the grass together, 
one a lady seated, the other a man, with his head in 
the lady’s lap. I gave a leap as if a bullet had gone 
through my heart, then instinctively drew back behind 
the rock. There I came to myself, and began to take 
courage. She had gone away for the night : it could 
not be she ! I peeped. The man had raised his head, 
and was leaning on his elbow. It was Edmund. I 
was certain ! She stooped and kissed him. I scram- 
bled to the top of the rock, and sprang across the 
stream, w T hich ran below me like a flooded mill-race. 
Would to God I had missed the bank, and been 
swept to the great fall ! I was careless, and when I 
lighted, I fell. Her clear mocking laugh rang through 
the air, and echoed from the scoop of some still 
mountain. When I rose, they were on their feet. 


2J2 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ ‘ Quite a chamois-spring ! ’ remarked the lady 
with derision. 

“ She saw the last moment was come. Neither of 
us two spoke. 

“‘I told you,’ she said, ‘neither of you was to 
trouble me to-night : you have paid no regard to my 
wish for quiet ! It is time the foolery should end ! I 
am weary of it. A woman can not marry a double 
man — or half a man either — without at least being 
able to tell which is which of the two halves ! ’ 

“ She ended with a toneless laugh, in which my 
brother joined. She turned upon him with a pitiless 
mockery which, I see now, must have left in his mind 
the conviction that she had been but making game of 
him ; while I never doubted myself the dupe. Not 
once had she received me as I now saw her : though 
the night was warm, her deshabille was yet a some- 
what prodigal unmasking of her beauty to the moon ! 
The conviction in each of us was, that she and the 
other were laughing at him. 

“We locked in a deadly struggle, with what object 
I can not tell. I do not believe either of us had an 
object. It was a mere blind conflict of pointless en- 
mity, in which each cared but to overpower the other. 
Which first laid hold, which, if either, began to drag, I 
have not a suspicion. The next thing I know is, we 
were in the water, each in the grasp of the other, now 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


273 

rolling, now sweeping, now tumbling along, in deadly 
^embrace. 

“ The shock of the ice-cold water, and the sense of 
our danger, brought me to myself. I let my brother 
go, but he clutched me still. Down we shot together 
toward the sheer descent. Already we seemed fall- 
ing. The terror of it overmastered me. It was not 
the crash I feared, but the stayless rush through the 
whistling emptiness. In the agony of my despair, I 
pushed him from me with all my strength, striking at 
him a fierce, wild, aimless blow — the only blow struck 
in the wrestle. His hold relaxed. I remember noth- 
ing more.” 

At this point of the verbal narrative, my uncle Ed- 
mund again spoke : 

“You "never struck me, Ed,” he cried; “or if you 
did, I was already senseless. I remember nothing of 
the water.” 

“ When I came to myself,” the manuscript goes on, 
“ I was lying in a pebbly shoal. The moon was aloft 
in heaven. I was cold to the heart, cold to the mar- 
row of my bones. I could move neither hand nor 
foot, and thought I was dead. By slow degrees a 
little power came back, and I managed at length, after 
much agonizing effort, to get up on my feet — only to 
fall again. After several such failures, I found myself 
capable of dragging myself along like a serpent, and 


274 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


so got out of the water, and on the next endeavor was 
able to stand. I had forgotten everything ; but when 
my eyes fell on the darting torrent, I remembered all 
— not as a fact, but as a terrible dream from which I 
thanked heaven I had come awake. 

“ But as I tottered along, I came slowly to myself, 
and a fearful doubt awoke. If it was a dream, where 
had I dreamed it ? How had I come to wake where 
I found myself ? How had the dream turned real 
about me ? Where was I last in my remembrance ? 
Where was my brother i Where was the lady in the 
moonlight ? No, it was not a dream ! If my brother 
had not got out of the water, I was his murderer ! I 
had struck him ! — Oh, the horror of it ! If only I 
could stop dreaming it — three times almost every 
night ! ” 

Again uncle Edmund interposed — not altogether 
logically : 

“ I tell you, I don’t believe you struck me, Ed ! 
And you must remember, neither of us would have 
got out if you hadn’t! ” 

“ You might have let me go ! ” said the other. 

“On the way down the Degenfall, perhaps!" re- 
joined uncle Edmund. “ — I believe it was that blow 
brought me to my senses, and made me get out ! ” 

“Thank you, Ed!” said uncle Edward. 

Once more I write from the manuscript. 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


275 


“ I said to myself he must have got out ! It could 
not be that I had drowned my own brother ! Such a 
ghastly thing could not have been permitted ! It was 
too terrible to be possible ! 

“ How, then, had we been living the last few months ? 
What brothers had we been ? Had we been loving one 
another ? Had I been a neighbor to my nearest ? Had 
I been a brother to my twin ? Was not murder the 
natural outcome of it all ? He that loveth not his 
brother is a murderer ! If so, where the good of sav- 
ing me from being indeed what I was in nature ? I 
had cast off my brother for a treacherous woman ! 
My very thought sickened within me. 

“ My soul seemed to grow luminous and under- 
stand everything. I saw my whole behavior as it 
was. The scales fell from my inward eyes, and there 
came a sudden, total, and absolute revulsion in my 
conscious self — like what takes place, I presume, at 
the day of judgment, when the God in every man sits 
in judgment upon the man. Had the gate of heaven 
stood wide open, neither angel with flaming sword, 
nor Peter with the keys to dispute my entrance, I 
would have turned away from it, and ‘sought the 
deepest, hell. I loathed the woman and myself ; in 
my heart the sealed fountain of old affection had 
broken out, and flooded it. 

*' All the time this thinking went on, I was crawl- 


2y6 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


ing. slowly up the endless river toward the chalet, 
driven by a hope inconsistent with what I knew of 
my brother. What I felt, he, if he were alive, must 
be feeling also : how then could I say to myself that 
I should find him with her ? It was the last dying 
hope that I had not killed him that thus fooled me. 
i She will be warming him in her bosom ! ’ I said. But 
at the very touch, the idea turned and presented its 
opposite pole. ‘ Good God ! ’ I cried in my heart, 
4 how shall I compass his deliverance ? Better he lay 
at the bottom of the fall, than live to be devoured 
by that serpent of hell ! I will go straight to the 
den of the monster, and demand my brother ! ’ ” 

But to see the eyes of uncle Edmund at this point 
of the story ! 

“At last I approached the chalet. All was still. 
A handkerchief lay on the grass, white in the moon- 
light. I went up to it, hoping to find it my brother’s. 
It was the lady’s. I flung it from me like a filthy rag. 

“What was the passion worth which in a moment 
could die so utterly ? 

“ I turned to the house. I would tear him from 
her : he was mine, not hers ! 

“ My wits were nigh gone. I thought the moon- 
light was dissolving the chalet, that the two within 
might escape me. I held it fast with my eyes. The 
moon drew back : she only possessed and filled it ! 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


2 77 


No; the moon was too pure: she but shone reflected 
from the windows ; she would not go in ! I would go 
in! I was Justice! The woman was a thief! She 
had broken into the house of life, and was stealing! 

“ I stood for a moment looking up at her window. 
There was neither motion nor sound. Was she gone 
away, and my brother with her ? Could she be in bed 
and asleep, after seeing us swept down the river to the 
Degenfall ? Could he be with her and at rest, believ- 
ing me dashed to pieces ? I must be resolved ! The 
door was not bolted ; I stole up the stair to her cham- 
ber. The door of it was wide open. I entered, and 
stood. The moon filled the tiny room with a clear, 
sharp-edged, pale-yellow light. She lay asleep, lovely 
to look at as an angel of God. Her hair, part of it 
thrown across the top-rail of the little iron bed, 
streamed out on each side over the pillow, and in 
the midst of it lay her face, a radiant isle in a dark 
sea. I stood and gazed. Fascinated by her beauty ? 
God forbid ! I was fascinated by the awful incon- 
gruity between that face, pure as the moonlight, and 
the charnel-house that lay unseen behind it. She was 
to me, henceforth, not a woman, but a live Death. I 
had no sense of sacredness, such as always in the 
chamber even of a little girl. How should I ? It was 
no chamber ; it was a den. She was no woman, but a 
female monster. I stood and gazed. 


278 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ My presence was more potent than I knew. She 
opened her eyes — opened them straight into mine. 
All the color sank away out of her face, and it stiff- 
ened to that of a corpse. With the staring eyes of 
one strangled, she lay as motionless as I stood. I 
moved not an inch, spoke not a word, drew not a step 
nearer, retreated not a hair’s-breadth. Motion was 
taken from me. Was it hate that fixed my eyes on 
hers, and turned my limbs into marble ? It certainly 
was not love, but neither was it hate. 

“ Agony had been burrowing in me like a mole ; 
the half of what I felt I have not told you : I came to 
find my brother, and found only, in a sweet sleep, the 
woman who had just killed him. The bewilderment 
of it all, with my long insensibility and wet garments, 
had taken from me either the power of motion or of 
volition, I do not know which : speechless in the moon- 
light, I must have looked to the wretched woman both 
ghostly and ghastly. 

“ Two or three long moments she gazed with those 
horror-struck eyes; then a frightful shriek broke 
from her drawn, death-like lips. She who could sleep 
after turning love into hate, life into death, would 
have fled into hell to escape the eyes of the dead ! 
Insensibility is not courage. Wake in the scornfullest 
mortal the conviction that one of the disembodied 
stands before him, and he will shiver like an aspen- 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 


279 


leaf. Scream followed scream. Volition or strength, 
whichever it was that had left me, returned. I backed 
from the room, went noiseless from the house, and 
fled, as if she had been the ghost and I the mortal. 
Would I had been the specter for which she took 
me!” 

Here uncle Edmund again spoke : 

“ Small wonder she screamed, the wretch ! ” he 
cried : “ that was her second dose of the horrible that 
night ! You found the door unbolted because I had 
been there before you. I too entered her room, and 
saw her asleep as you describe. I went close to her 
bedside, and cried out, 1 Where is my brother ? ’ She 
woke, and fainted, and I left her.” 

“ Then,” said I, “ when she came to herself, think- 
ing she had had a bad dream, she rearranged her hair, 
and went to sleep again ! ” 

“Just so, I dare say, little one!” answered uncle 
Edward. 

“ I had not yet begun to think what I should do, 
when I found myself at our little inn,” the manuscript 
continues. “ No idea of danger to myself awoke in 
my mind, nor was there any cause to heed such an 
idea, had it come. Nobody there knew the one from 
the other of us. Not many would know there were 
two of us. Any one who saw me twice, might well 
think he had seen us both. If my brother’s body 


280 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


were found in the valley-stream, it was not likely to 
be recognized, or to be indeed recognizable. The 
only one who could tell what happened at the top of 
the fall, would hardly volunteer information. But, 
while I knew myself my brother’s murderer, I thought 
no more of these sheltering facts than I did of danger. 
I made it no secret that my brother had gone over the 
fall. I went to the foot of the cataract, thence to 
search and inquire all down the stream, but no one 
had heard of any dead body being found. They told 
me that the poor gentleman must, before morning, 
have been far on his way to the Danube. 

“ Giving up the quest in despair, I resigned myself 
to a torture which has hitherto come no nearer ex- 
pending itself than the consuming fire of God. 

“ I dared not carry home the terrible news, which 
must either involve me in lying, or elicit such confes- 
sion as would multiply tenfold my father’s anguish, 
and was in utter perplexity what to do, when it oc- 
curred to me that I ought to inquire after letters at 
the lodgings where last we had lived together. Then 
first I learned that both my father and my elder 
brother, your father, little one, were dead. 

“ The sense of guilt had not destroyed in me the 
sense of duty. I did not care what became of the 
property, but I did care for my brother’s child, and 
the interests of her succession. 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES.' 


28l 


“Your father had all his life been delicate, and 
had suffered not a little. When your mother died, 
about a year after their marriage, leaving us you, it 
soon grew plain to see that, while he loved you dearly, 
and was yet more friendly to all about him than be- 
fore, his heart had given up the world. When I knew 
he was gone, I shed more tears over him than I had 
yet shed over my twin : the worm that never dies 
made my brain too hot to weep much for Edmund. 
Then first I saw that my elder brother had been a 
brother indeed, and that we twins had never been real 
to each other. I saw, what nothing but self-loathing 
would ever have brought me to see, that my love to 
Edmund had not been profound : while a man is him- 
self shallow, how should his love be deep ! I saw that 
we had each loved our elder brother in a truer and 
better fashion than we had loved each other. One of 
the chief active bonds between us had been fun ; 
another, habit ; and another, constitutional resem- 
blance — not one of them strong. Underneath were 
bonds far stronger, but they had never come into con- 
scious play ; no strain had reached them. They were 
there, I say ; for wherever is the poorest flower of 
love, it is there in virtue of the perfect root of love; 
and love’s root must one day blossom into love’s per- 
fect rose. My chief consolation under the burden of 
my guilt is, that I love my brother since I killed him, 


282 ' THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 

far more than I loved him when we were all to each 
other. Had we never quarreled, and were he alive, I 
should not be loving him thus ! 

“That we shall meet again, and live in the devo- 
tion of a far deeper love, I feel in the very heart of 
my soul. That it is my miserable need that has 
wrought in me this confidence, is no argument against 
the confidence. As misery alone sees miracles, so is 
there many a truth into which misery alone can enter. 
My little one, do not pity your uncle much ; I have 
learned to lift up my heart to God. I look to him 
who is the saviour of men to deliver me from blood- 
guiltiness — to lead me into my brother’s pardon, and 
enable me somehow to make up to him for the wrong 
I did him. 

“ Some would think I ought to give myself up to 
justice. But I felt and feel that I owe my brother 
reparation, not my country the opportunity of retri- 
bution. It can not be demanded of me to pretermit, 
because of my crime, the duty more strongly required 
of me because of the crime. Must I not use my best 
endeavor to turn aside its evil consequences from 
others ? Was I, were it even for the cleansing of my 
vile soul, to leave the child of my brother alone with 
a property, exposing her to the machinations of 
prowling selfishness! Would it atone for the wrong 
of depriving her of one uncle, to take the other from 


THE STORY OF MY TWIN UNCLES. 283 

her, and so leave her defenseless with a burden she 
could not carry ? Must I take so-called justice on 
myself at her expense — to the oppression, darkening, 
and endangering of her life ? Were I accused, I 
would tell the truth; but I would not volunteer a 
phantasmal atonement. What comfort would it be to 
my brother that I was hanged ? Let the punishment 
God pleased come upon me, I said; as far as lay in 
me, I would live for my brother’s child ! I have lived 
for her. 

“ But I am, and have been, and shall, I trust, 
throughout my earthly time, and what time thereafter 
may be needful, always be, in Purgatory. I should 
tremble at the thought of coming out of it a moment 
ere it had done its part. 

“ One day, after my return home, as I unpacked a 
portmanteau, my fingers slipped into the pocket of a 
waistcoat, and came upon something which, when I 
brought it to the light, proved a large ruby. A pang 
went to my heart. I looked at the waistcoat, and 
found it the one I had worn that terrible night : the 
ruby was the stone of the ring Edmund always wore. 
It must have been loose, and had got there in our 
struggle. Every now and then I am drawn to look at 
it. At first I saw in it only the blood ; now I see the 
light also. The moon of hope rises higher as the sun 
of life approaches the horizon. 


284 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ I was never questioned about the death of my 
twin brother. One, of two so like, must seem enough. 
Our resemblance, I believe, was a bore, which the 
teasing use we made of it aggravated ; therefore the 
fact that there was no longer a pair of us, could not 
be regarded as cause for regret, and things quickly 
settled down to the state in which you so long knew 
them. If there be one with a suspicion of the terrible 
truth, it is cousin Martha. 

“ You will not be surprised that you should never 
have heard of your uncle Edmund. 

“ I dare not ask you, my child, not to love me less; 
for perhaps you ought to do so. If you do, I have my 
consolation in the fact that my little one can not make 
me love her less.” 

Thus ended the manuscript, signed with my uncle’s 
name and address in full, and directed to me at the 
bottom of the last page. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 


uncle Edmund’s appendix. 

When my uncle Edward had told his story, cor- 
responding, though more conversational in form, with 
that I have now transcribed, my uncle Edmund took 
up his part of the tale from the moment when he came 
to himself after their fearful rush down the river. It 
was to this effect : 

He lay on the very verge of the hideous void. 
How it was that he got thus far and no farther, he 
never could think. He was out of the central chan- 
nel, and the water that ran all about him and poured 
immediately over the edge of the precipice, could not 
have sufficed to roll him there. Finding himself on 
his back, and trying to turn on his side in order to 
rise, his elbow found no support, and lifting his head a 
little, he looked down into a moon-pervaded abyss, 
where thin silvery vapors were stealing about. One 
turn, and he would have been on his way, plumb-down, 
to the valley below — say, rather, on his way off the 
face of the world into the vast that bosoms the stars 


286 THE flight of the shadow. 

and the systems and the cloudy worlds. His very soul 
quivered with terror. The pang of it was so keen that 
it saved him from the swoon in which he might yet 
have dropped from the edge of the world. Not dar- 
ing to rise, and unable to roll himself up the slight 
slope, he shifted himself sideways along the ground, 
inch by inch, for a few yards, then rose, and ran stag- 
gering away, as from a monster that might wake and 
pursue and overtake him. He doubted if he would 
ever have recovered the sudden shock of his awful 
position, of his one glance into the ghastly depth, but 
for the worse horror of the all-but-conviction that his 
brother had gone down to Hades through that terrible 
descent. If only he too had gone, he cried in his 
misery, they would now be together, with no wicked 
woman between their hearts! For his love too was 
changed into loathing. He too was at once, and en- 
tirely, and forever freed from her fascination. The 
very thought of her was hateful to him. 

With straight course, but wavering walk, he made 
his way through the moonlight to demand his brother. 
He too picked up the handkerchief and dropped it 
with disgust. 

What followed in the lady’s chamber, I have al- 
ready given in his own words. 

When he fled from the chalet it was with self- 
slaughter in his heart. But he endured in the comfort 


UNCLE EDMUND’S APPENDIX. 


287 

of the thought that the door of death was always 
open, that he might enter when he would. He sought 
the foot of the fall the same night ; then, as one pos- 
sessed of demons to the tombs, fled to the solitary 
places of the dark mountains. 

He went through many a sore stress. Ignorant of 
the death of his father and his elder brother, the 
dread misery of encountering them with his brother’s 
blood on his soul barred his way home. He could 
not bear the thought of reading in their eyes his own 
horror of himself His money was soon spent, and 
for months he had to endure severe hardships — of sim- 
ple, wholesome human sort. He thought afterward 
that, if he had had no trouble of that kind, his brain 
would have yielded. He would have surrendered 
himself but for the uselessness of it, and the misery 
and public stare it would bring upon his family. 

Knowing German well, and contriving at length to 
reach Berlin, he found employment there of various 
kinds, and for a good many years managed to live as 
well as he had any heart for, and spare a little for 
some worse off than himself. Having no regard to 
his health, however, he had at length a terrible attack 
of brain-fever, and, but partially recovering his facul- 
ties after it, was placed in an asylum. There he 
dreamed every night of his home, came awake with 
the joy of the dream, and could sleep no more for 


288 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


longing, not to go home — that he dared not think of 
— but to look upon the place, if only once again. 
The longing grew till it became intolerable. By his 
talk in his sleep, the good people about him, learning 
his condition, gave and gathered money to send him 
home. On his way, he came to himself quite, but 
when he reached England, he found he dared not go 
near the place of his birth. He remained therefore in 
London, where he made the barest livelihood by copy- 
ing legal documents. In this way he spent a few 
miserable years, and then suddenly set out to walk to 
the house of his fathers. He had but five shillings in 
his possession when the impulse came upon him. 

He reached the moor, and had fallen exhausted, 
when a solitary gypsy, rare phenomenon, I presume, 
with a divine spot awake in his heart, found him, gave 
him some gin, and took him to a hut he had in the 
wildest part of the heath. He lay helpless for a week, 
and then began to recover. When he was sufficiently 
restored, he helped his host to weave the baskets 
which, as soon as he had enough to make a load, he 
took about the country in a cart. He soon became 
so clever at the work as quit'e to earn his food and 
shelter, making more baskets while the gypsy was 
away selling the others. At home, the old horse 
managed to live, or rather not to die, on the moor, 
and, all things considered, had not a very hard life of 


UNCLE EDMUND’S APPENDIX. 


289 

it. On his back, uncle Edmund, ill able to walk so 
far — for he was anything but strong now, would 
sometimes go wandering in the twilight, or when the 
moon shone, to some spot whence he could see his 
old home. Occasionally he would even go round and 
round the house while we slept, like a ghost dreaming 
of ancient days. 

“But,” I said, interrupting his narrative, “the 
horseman I saw that night in the storm could not 
have been you, uncle ; for the horse was a grand 
creature, rearing like the horse with Peter the Great 
on his back, in the corner of the map of Russia! ” 

“Were you out that terrible night?” he returned. 
“ The lightning was enough to frighten even an older 
horse than the gypsy’s. — I wonder how my friend is 
getting on ! He must think me very ungrateful ! But 
I dare say he imagines me lying fathom-deep in the 
bog. — You will do something for him, won’t you, 
Ed?” 

“You shall do for him yourself what you please, 
Ed,” answered my own uncle, “and I will help you.” 

“But, uncle Edmund,” I said, “if it was you we 
saw, the place you were in was a very boggy one 
always, and nearly a lake then ! ” 

“I thought I should never get out!” he replied. 
“ But for the poor horse and his owner, I should not 
have minded.” 


20 


290 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


“ How did you get out of it, uncle ? ” I persisted. 
“ Lady Cairnedge smothered a splendid black horse 
not far from there. Through the darkness I heard 
him going down. It makes me shudder every time I 
think of it.” 

“ I can not tell you, child. I suppose my gray 
was such a skeleton that the bog couldn’t hold him. 
I left it all to him, and he got himself and me too out 
of it somehow. It was too dark, as you know, to see 
anything between the flashes. I remember we were 
pretty deep sometimes.” 

He went back to London after that, and had come 
and gone once or twice, he said. When he came he 
always lodged with his gypsy friend. He had learned 
that his father was dead, but took the Mr. Whichcote 
he heard mentioned, for his elder brother, David, my 
father. 

I asked him how it was he appeared to such pur- 
pose, and in the very nick of time, that afternoon 
when Lady Cairnedge had come with her servants to 
carry John away; for of course I knew now that our 
champion must have been uncle Edmund. He an- 
swered he had that very morning made up his mind 
to present himself at the house, and had walked 
there for the purpose, resolved to tell his brother all. 
He got in by the end of the garden, as John was in 
the way of doing, and had reached the little grove of 


UNCLE EDMUND’S APPENDIX. 


29I 


firs by the house, when he saw a carriage at the door, 
and drew back. Hearing then- the noises of attack 
and defense, he came to the window and looked in, 
heard Lady Cairnedge’s shriek, saw her on the floor, 
and the men attempting to force an entrance at the 
other side of the window. Hardly knowing what he 
did, he rushed at them and beat them off. Then sud- 
denly turning faint, for his heart was troublesome, he 
retired into the grove, and lay there helpless for a 
time. He recovered only to hear the carriage drive 
away, leaving quiet behind it. 

To see that woman in the house of his fathers, 
was a terrible shock to him. Could it be that David 
had married her ? He stole from his covert, and 
crawled across the moor to the gypsy’s hut. There he 
was consoled by learning that the mistress of the 
house was a young girl, whom he rightly concluded to 
be the daughter of his brother David. 

In making a second visit with the same intent, he 
had another attack of the heart, and now knew that 
he would have died in the snow had not John found 
him. 


CHAPTER XXXVI. 


THE END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 

We returned to England the next day. All the 
journey through, my uncles were continually re- 
verting to the matter of John’s parentage: the 
more they saw of him, the less could they believe 
Lady Cairnedge his mother. Through questions 
put to him, and inquiries afterward made, they 
discovered that, when he went to London, he had 
gone to Lady Cairnedge’s lawyer, not his father’s, 
of whom he had never heard — which accounted for 
his having on that occasion learned nothing of 
consequence to him. When we reached London, 
my uncle Edmund, who, having been bred a lawyer, 
knew how to act, went at once to examine the will 
left by John’s father. That done, he set out for 
the place where John was born. The rest of us went 
home. 

The second day after our arrival there uncle Ed- 
mund came. He had found perfect proof, not only 
that Lady Cairnedge was John’s step-mother, but that 


THE END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 


293 

she had no authority over him or his property what- 
ever. 

A long discussion took place in my uncles’ study — 
I have to shift the apostrophe of possession — as to 
whether John ought to compel restitution of what she 
might have wrongfully spent or otherwise appro- 
priated. She had been left an income by each of her 
husbands, upon either of which incomes she might 
have lived at ease ; but they had a strong suspicion, 
soon entirely justified, that while spending John’s 
money, she had been saving up far more than her 
own. But in the discussion, John held to it that, as 
she had once been the wife of his father, he would 
spare her so far — provided she had nowise impover- 
ished either of the estates. He would insist only 
upon her immediate departure. 

“Yes, little one,” said my uncle, one summer even- 
ing, as he and I talked together, seated alone in the 
wilderness, “ what we call misfortune is always the 
only good fortune. Few will say yes in response, but 
Truth is independent of supporters, being justified by 
her children. 

“Until misfortune found us,” he went on, “my 
brother and I had indeed loved one another, but 
with a love so poor that a wicked woman was 
able to send it to sleep. To what she might 
have brought us, had she had full scope, God 


294 


THE FLIGHT OF THE SHADOW. 


only knows : now all the women in hell could not sepa- 
rate us ! ” 

“ And all the women in paradise would but bring 
you closer ! ” I ventured to add. 

The day after our marriage, which took place 
within a month of our return from Paris, John went to 
Rising, on a visit to Lady Cairnedge of anything but 
ceremony, and took his uncles and myself with 
him. 

“Will you tell her ladyship,” he said to the foot- 
man, “ that Mr. Day desires to see her.” 

The man would have shut the door in our 
faces, with the words, “ I will see if my lady is 
at home,” but John was prepared for him. He 
put his foot between the door and the jamb,' 
and his two hands against the door, driving it to 
the wall with the man behind it. There he held 
him till we were all in, then closed the door, and 
said to him, in a tone I had never heard him use till 
that moment, 

“ Let Lady Cairnedge know at once that Mr. Day 
desires to see her.” 

The man went. We walked into the white draw- 
ing-room, the same where I sat alone among the mir- 
rors the morning after I was lost on the moor. How 
well I remembered it ! 

There we waited. The gentlemen stood, but, John 


THE END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 


-295 


insisting, I sat — my eyes fixed on the door by which 
we had entered. In a few minutes, however, a slight 
sound in another part of the room caused me to turn 
them thitherward. There stood Lady Cairnedge, in a 
riding-habit, with a whip in her hand, staring, pale as 
death, at my uncles. Then, with a scornful laugh, she 
turned and went through a door immediately behind 
her, which closed instantly, and became part of the 
wainscot, hardly distinguishable. John darted to it. 
It was bolted on the outside. He sought another 
door, and ran hither and thither through the house 
to find the woman. My uncles ran after him, afraid 
something might befall him. I remained where I was, 
far from comfortable. Two or three minutes passed, 
and then I heard the thunder of hoofs. I ran to the 
window. There she was tearing across the park at 
full gallop, on just such a huge black horse as she 
had smothered in the bog ! I was the only one of us 
that saw her, and not one of us ever set eyes upon 
her again. 

When we went over the house, it soon became 
plain to us that she had been in readiness for a sud- 
den retreat, having prepared for it after a fashion of 
her own : not a single small article of value was to be 
discovered in it. John’s great-aunt, who left him the 
property, died in the house, possessed of a large num- 
ber of jewels, many of them of great price both in 


296 THE flight of the shadow. 

themselves and because of their antiquity : not one of 
them was ever found. 

A report reached us long after, that Lady Cairn- 
edge was found dead in her bed in a hotel in the 
Tyrol. 

My uncles lived for many years on the old farm. 
Uncle Edmund bought a gray horse, as like uncle 
Edward’s as he could find one, only younger. I often 
wondered what Death must think — to know he had his 
master on his back, and yet see him mounted by his 
side. Every day one or the other, most days both, 
would ride across the moor to see us. For many 
years Martha walked in at the door at least once 
every week. 

My uncles took no pains, for they had no desire, to 
be distinguished the one from the other. Each was 
always ready to meet any obligation of the other. If 
one made an appointment, few could tell which it was 
and nobody which would keep it. No one could tell, 
except, perhaps, one who had been present, which of 
them had signed any document ; their two hands were 
absolutely indistinguishable. I do not believe either 
of them, after a time, always himself knew whether 
the name was his or his brother’s. He could only be 
always certain it must have been written by one of 
them. But each indifferently was ready to honor the 
signature, Ed. Whichcote. 


THE END OF THE FIRST VOLUME, 


297 


They died within a month of each other. Their 
bodies lie side by side. On their one tombstone is the 
inscription : 

HERE LIE THE DISUSED GARMENTS OF 

EDWARD AND EDMUND WHICHCOTE, 

BORN FEB. 29, 1804; 

DIED JUNE 30, AND 
JULY 28, 1864. 

THEY ARE NOT HERE; * THEY ARE RISEN. 

John and I are waiting. 

Belorba Day, 


THE END, 









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